


Parasite, Paradise

by ishre_yann



Category: Blame! (Manga), Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Blood and Gore, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, Mutual Pining, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Rating May Change, Shiros POV, Slow Burn, Trans Pidge | Katie Holt, banana science fiction because I know v little of these things, keith pov
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-06-10
Updated: 2018-09-29
Packaged: 2019-05-20 13:08:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 6
Words: 28,963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14895194
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ishre_yann/pseuds/ishre_yann
Summary: Shiro doesn't know who he is. Shiro doesn't know why he is. Shiro only knows one thing; he needs to find someone (or something) with Net Terminal Genes. The City kills, the City is cold, the City is ruthless - it takes and rarely gives. Rarely.





	1. My name is Shiro

**Author's Note:**

> Hi folks! This fic was inspired by [v-0-3's fanart](https://v-0-3.tumblr.com/post/165967840222/%E4%BA%8C), and I really hope this fic will live up to the art, because I'm a sucker for Blame! and Takashi Shirogane.  
> A small note, before I let you proceed: English is not my first language, so you'll probably find some horrors. Thankfully, [imhereformysciencefriends](http://imhereformysciencefriends.tumblr.com) ([HaroThar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/HaroThar/pseuds/HaroThar) on AO3) has kindly offered to beta it for me and save it from myself jhgfghjhg  
> Enjoy <3
> 
>  **14/16 update:** I made a [playlist](https://spoti.fi/2JCJ4iL)!!! Because I have no impulse control and I'm a music addict, so I need to be in the mood for anything.

The City was a silent, lonely place. Masses of metal panels fused together, some clearly built from scraps, others older—polished. Tons of cables hung from unnecessarily wide ceilings, and probably one in twenty of them worked. Small windows were the only access to closed-off areas, rooms which were never intended to be opened or made use of. Mazes, bridges, arches, and panels mixed in front of Shiro’s eyes. It was easy, getting lost through it—and yet, that’s exactly what Shiro had to do. He’d been walking for

> DataError: Missing data.    
>       in line 353: if (system.upTime==None):raise DataError("Missing data.")

His system had been damaged. He didn’t know how long he’d been walking, but energy levels were in check. Shiro ran another diagnostic in the background while he kept going. He’d turned left a few days ago, so he chose to go right this time—down in the canals, one level under. His suit was holding up just fine—so far, he hadn’t had any encounters with the Safeguard. Abandoned levels weren’t patrolled as heavily as the upper ones; the closer he’d get to the Megastructure, the more dangerous it would get.

> System diagnostic complete.  
>  Corrupted files: 32    
>  Delete corrupted files? (Y/N)     
>       > Y   
>  The following files will be REMOVED    
>       112495L.log 112544L.log 11552L.log 125881L.log 995L.log 32L.log cogxto_or.exe cogxto_or.cab cog_restore.bff cog_backup.bff SG_00021.egt SG_Perms.reg SG_rec.reg SG_rnk.reg SL_database.txt SL_patterns.txt SL_protocol.exe  
>  0 to upgrade, 0 to newly install, 32 to remove and 8096886 not to upgrade. After this operation, 35TB disk space will be freed.    
>  Do you want to continue? (Y/N)    
>       > Y   
>  Running. . .     
>  Corrupted files erased: 32 (100%)      
>  Diagnostic successful.      
>  Reboot System? (Y/N)   
>       > Y

Shiro blinked. His vision emptied for a second, leaving only the cold plates and bleak walls of the City in front of him. Shiro gave it a few seconds for the system to come back online and analyse his surroundings, materials, distance, anything that could be useful.

A clank in the distance drew Shiro’s attention in front of him. The dark hallway curved further inside the giant building he’d seen right before getting deeper into the City. Shiro grazed his fingers against his Gravitational Beam Emitter. The emitter slid easily out of its holster, light filling the first bar—as much power Shiro was used to employing. Safeguards were easy to pierce through; he needed to preserve his own energy levels for the Megastructure.

Shiro leaned closer to the wall and treaded carefully so he would be as silent as possible. Whatever caused the noise, it wasn’t aware of him—or Shiro would’ve already been shooting his emitter. It took him a few seconds to reach the curving wall and tilt his head to check the rest of the hallway.

His receptors showed nothing, as well as his sight.

Shiro relaxed and stalked slowly but steadily. His senses were tensed and alert, ready to go. Surviving the City was just a matter of luck. Shiro had been out enough to understand its chaotic dynamics, to know better than to assume he was always safe, or always in danger. It was a matter of time before something bigger would catch up with him, or cross him, and he’d be wiped out of existence.

Had been nearly wiped out too, a few months before.

The hallway kept spiralling downwards, but there were no signs of Silicon life, nor human, or Safeguard. Its floors were an alternating mixture of concrete and metal plates. A few steps away, down the narrow curve of the wall, a long black nail rested untouched on the ground.

Shiro kneeled and grabbed it. A closer inspection helped him understand its composition, as well as find traces of biological residues on the far end. Shiro holstered the emitter, held the nail to his face, and licked it. System took a bit more than expected, matching every entry he’d already stored with the new one.

No matches.

Shiro dropped the nail on the ground and stood back up. It was as useless to him, practically an impediment.

A sharp push against his left shoulder. Shiro could only catch the nail piercing through with the corner of his eye before he ducked. A nail hissed and grazed his skin, drew blood. Shiro hauled himself away from the third nail. He dodged it and turned. Metal-like suits at the end of the corridor. Two—no, three guns pointed at him as he disengaged once more.

System didn’t switch to high alert. They were not Safeguards, nor Silicon life. Shiro disengaged and ducked once more—a nail digging in the concrete where he’d been.

“Wait!” One of the suits raised its fist. Then, it looked past Shiro. “Pidge, stop!”

Shiro raised his arm, instinct running fast and sharp. A nail pierced his forearm, stopping right before Shiro’s eye. System alerted him of the damage he suffered. He couldn’t feel anything.

“What the fuck?” ‘Pidge’ said, jumping backwards and pointing its gun at Shiro.

Shiro tilted his head. Pidge’s patterns as a scared animal, now separated from the pack.

“Yeah Keith, what the fuck?” Another voice behind Shiro. “Why did you stop us?”

“He’s… he’s not attacking us,” ‘Keith’ said. The tone of the suit’s voice sounded like it was questioning Shiro’s motivations too.

Shiro turned once more, gave his back to Pidge. Keith was in the middle of the other two suits, slightly taller than the one at his left but way smaller than the one at his right. Shiro tilde his head the other way around. “What are you?” Shiro inquired.

The taller suit startled. “Fuck me. It can speak?” it asked.

Shiro stared at the taller suit. He waited.

“Shit, uh, hey man. We’re chill, okay?”

“Shut up, Hunk,” Keith interrupted, he turned towards Shiro and stared him down. “What are _you?_ ”

Shiro was still waiting it out. Yet, when it became clear that none of the suits would answer, he shifted his focus on the nails still stuck in his body. First, his forearm. He drew blood, noticed the suits twitch in response.

“Oy, you shouldn’t do that-”

Shiro dropped the metal nail on the ground and turned to the one in his shoulder. His forearm was already healing, the system only displayed the time remaining for it to be fully operational.

“Keith, seriously, what do we do? He’ll lead the Safeguard right on our doorsteps if he keeps going.”

It was but a whisper, although Shiro wasn’t exactly calibrated on humans’ perceptions. Shiro let go of the second nail, only to see it being caught by the smaller suit. Pidge. Shiro stared curiously as the suit dropped to its knees and raided all the nails.

“You really ought to keep silent,” Pidge hissed at him.

The other suits were already checking for unwanted presence. “The nearest Safeguard is ten miles away,” Shiro pointed out.

The suits went silent once more. “And how would you know that, exactly?” The left suit, nameless.

“Are you humans?” Shiro insisted.

The suits silently conferred, exchanging silent stares—but everyone waited for Keith’s nod to turn back to Shiro and speak.

“Yeah, we are. What about it?” Pidge asked.

Shiro leaned forward, studying Pidge’s helmet until Pidge was uncomfortable enough to inch away. “I am looking for Net Terminal Genes. I need to scan you,” he explained.

“You need to _what,_ now?” nameless suit interjected. “I ain’t letting you do nothing to me.”

“Lance, please,” Keith sighed. His voice was scrapped, it came off as dismissive and cold. Similar to Shiro’s, really. “What’s that, exactly? And, uh, do you have a name?”

“Stand-by,” Shiro’s voice system prompted. “I am named Shiro,” he replied once System was a go. “I am looking for Net Terminal Genes—if you are humans, I need to scan you. Take off your helmets.”

The suits hesitated. Pidge had joined the rest of the group and was now tugging at Keith’s side. “They usually attack without asking,” he remarked. “This guy looks like a human and talks like one of the Safeguards. Can I study it? Maybe we can get something useful out of him… it. Whatever, you get what I mean.”

Shiro’s focus shifted from the humans to the direction he’d been walking. In that general direction, the humans had their nest. Maybe he could find more humans. He didn’t ponder too much on it, secrecy wasn’t really a problem—nor would it be. It wasn’t against protocol.

“I can transfer data to your device if you have one,” he said, pointing at Pidge. “I do not know much, but you will be able to analyse it.”

Pidge stared. “That’s it?”

“I want to scan you,” Shiro said. “Are there more of you?”

The suits went silent until Pidge stepped forward. “Hey, no! What are you doing?” Lance hurried, but Pidge stopped only once he was in front of Shiro. Then, he removed his helmet to the sound of Lance and Hunk’s scared gasps.

Pidge had light brown locks, stuck together by white patches and stitches. Round, broken glasses hid dark brown eyes and fair skin.

Shiro initialised the diagnosis.

“Negative,” Shiro stated, eyes focusing on the others.

Hunk was the next to side with Pidge. Bulky, bronze skin with brown eyes and dark hair, plus a stained yellow bandana hid the rest of his head, patched up as much as the rest of their gear.

Shiro initialised the diagnosis.

Negative.

Lance didn’t come closer, but he had already removed his helmet when Shiro focused on him.

Shiro initialised the diagnosis.

Negative.

Keith still had his helmet on. “I’ll answer that for you, negative too.” He said. “I’m not gonna risk my life for nobody.”

Shiro considered insisting, and then opted for a different approach. “Are there others with you?”

Lance’s eyes thinned at the question, Hunk’s forehead wrinkled up a few more lines. They looked young, although age was something the City did not care for anymore—neither did whoever lived in it. It was Pidge who approached Shiro once more.

“Don’t you need medication?” he asked.

Shiro stared, then checked his suit—the bleeding would stop soon enough, and he still had a few spare syringes. “They should be healed over in a few hours. My motor activity will not be affected by these,” Shiro replied. “Should I include system’s reports on it?”

Pidge looked surprised. “You serious?”

“Why should I not be?” Shiro tilted his head.

“Uh, riiight. Creepy guy is creepy.”

* * *

Shiro has been following the humans for a few hours by now. They all put their helmets on, Keith on the very front and all the others behind—he led the way like it was easy to walk the maze of tunnels, hallways, and dead ends the block was composed of.

They all had argued whether Shiro was reliable or not, and eventually decided it was best to leave him out of the camp. Just for precaution. Waiting was acceptable, from a statistical point of view. From what he’d gathered, the humans were a bigger colony—which meant he could scan easily all of them and be done with it.

Shiro stopped as soon as the group parted, just enough to let him walk through. It was a metal door with broken hinges, part of the wall had crumbled leaving a small hole that allowed Hunk to grab the plates and drag them. Then, he had to stop as soon as the door got stuck again on its own weight and against the floor.

“Aw shucks,” Hunk huffed, tried once more to drag the plates. Nothing.

Lance cursed. “Perfect, now we need another hideout.”

Shiro put a hand on Hunk’s shoulder, the young man suffocated a yelp and moved, allowing Shiro to get closer and grab the plates. It took System a split second to determine the door weight and how much strength he’d need to employ.

The humans went silent when Shiro raised the door and opened it completely, the hinges crying sharp noises.

“Holy shit,” Pidge breathed out.

Shiro walked into the dark room, it had only a few entrances that allowed it to get deeper into the building, but Shiro wasn’t here to explore. He turned, eyes on Pidge. “I will prepare the files for transfer, it should take between eight to ten hours. Do you have”

> Computing. . .

“One hundred, eighty-one point two terabytes hardware space?” he asked.

Pidge shook his head. “We’ve used all of them.”

Shiro found himself looking for a solution. “I will look for spare parts. Three levels above System scans showed unusual readings,” he remembered.

“Should- should I stay here?” Pidge suggested.

A whole choir of “absolutely no” and “no” raised at his question.

“Aw c’mon guys! When will we ever get another possibility like this? I need that data!”

Everyone turned to Keith, waiting for his last word. Shiro was unable to analyse Keith’s facial expression, which meant he was as at a loss as everyone else. Keith stared back at Pidge, arms crossed, and then he sighed—he looked away, shoulder falling.

Pidge almost jumped on his feet, fist in the air. “I’ll be careful, pinkie promise!” And then he joined Shiro inside the building.

The group stared, Shiro didn’t need analysis to know tension. Still, he didn’t intend to pose a threat—which made every sign of distrust useless. Shiro didn’t need them to trust him. As long as they would allow him to scan them, he’d be on his way sooner than later.

“We’ll see you in eight vargas.” Keith’s voice sounded more like an order, rather than a promise.

Shiro started a timer. If only... “Time unit not recognised.”

“What? What do you use?” Lance enquired.

“Seconds, minutes, and hours,” Shiro said.

Pidge shooed them away. “I’ll explain! You guys go, we’ll catch up in eight vargas.”

The others hesitated but nodded and eventually walked away. Shiro followed their direction until the door cut them out of his peripheral. He moved and dragged the door back on its own path until it was perfectly aligned to the wall.

“Okay, we need a plan,” Pidge said. “But first, let’s get the timing straight.”

By the end of Pidge’s explanation, Shiro was already elaborating a route which would take them back to the hideout in less than eight vargas.


	2. Are we the hunters?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew! There it is!!  
> As always, many thanks to HaroThar for editing and beta-reading this.  
> No new tags for this chapter, if I'm not mistaken. If you do find any, please let me know and I'll add them :D
> 
> Enjoy <3
> 
> Here's the [playlist](https://spoti.fi/2JCJ4iL) I made <3 (a few songs will be added / have already been added)

They reached their first stop. Yellow lights flickered over his head as he undressed. It was a lone shack, a few vargas away from the village—panels of both metal and concrete were left unsupervised and hanging onto one another. The whole place was shades of white and greys, sometimes hard edges, sometimes crumbled pieces, missing pieces, curved pieces. It was grotesque, in a way, and yet everything fit and lined up in an unusual, crooked balance; the rough edges, the worn-off floors and roofs, and the smooth surfaces.

Keith could tell where other  _things_ fell, carving holes in the higher levels, and then down until they met the bottom—metal pikes, grills. Sometimes they’d catch his eyes, a quick flash of light, and then dark again. Nobody was sure what laid beneath them, they only knew it kept going, and going, and going. Maybe some things fell down until they could smell what once was dirt. Or that’s what old legends told. If you drove long enough in the cracks between the structures, if you lived long enough to reach deep down, if you were lucky and survived long enough, you’d find it; whatever it was the City and the Megastructure on it were built upon.

Keith slammed his helmet over the table inside the changing room. The sound echoed in the around them, bringing nothing but more loneliness and isolation to the whole place. Keith was  _boiling_ with rage. Who the fuck was that guy? How did he find them? Why did Pidge never listen to him? Together with the rest of the group, of course.

Keith kicked a boot off. “Fuck!”

“Hey man, chill out,” Lance said but hesitated to put his hand on Keith’s shoulder.

Keith shot him a glare, and then at Hunk too. He was not taking any bullshit excuses. Not after everything they’d done to get to a safe place and keep it that way. “What if you guys got infected? What if  _Pidge_ gets infected? You remember the elders’ tales, right? You  _know_ what happened the last time our people let strangers in.”

Lance and Hunk stared at each other and then lowered their heads, nodding. “I mean, you told us to stop attacking him-”

“Yeah! Not to remove  _your fucking helmet_ and stare in its eyes!” Keith snapped.

Hunk shifted uncomfortably on his feet. “So, uh, what do we do now? How do we know if we’re infected?”

Keith took a moment to gather himself. Deep breaths. He finished undressing and grabbed his own clothes from the worn down lockers. Everything was falling apart, but it’s been holding for who knows how long—and Zuru, together with the elders, insisted they’d stay there. Zuru was the last one to know the path to the food station—and Allura was the only one able to use it. Sometimes Keith wondered what Zuru was thinking, passing her days staring at the dark hanging on their heads, like it could drop any time.

Keith knew what had to be done, and it pained him he had to say it. “I’ll go find Zuru, ask her if she knows something, but you don’t get anywhere near the village,” he said—fists clenching.

Silence.

Lance dropped on the bench, half of his armour still on. “Aw man, I wanted to go see Allura,” he whined.

“Allura!” Hunk almost jumped at the realisation. “Go find Allura too! She’ll know what to do!”

Keith’s eyes thinned. “Yeah, she’ll wanna see this,” he agreed.

Hunk elbowed Lance next to him. “Nice, now you can stop brooding and go back to drooling.”

Lance went red in a split second. “Hey! I don’t drool! I- I, uh,” he stuttered a few words, before deciding. “I  _admire_ , intensely.”

Hunk laughed, while Keith rolled his eyes. “Sure thing, admirer.”

They changed into more comfortable clothes. This was a relatively safe area—nobody had encountered the Safeguard nor Silicon Creatures for ages, maybe deca-phoebes. Worn-out clothes, patched through with pieces of cloth, scraps, whatever they’d found and stolen from the City. Keith’d brought his own, an old leather jacket no one knew where it came from—he’d found it somewhere in the lower levels, abandoned on a pike, covered in wires and oil. Allura had shown him how to polish it and treat it, bringing the whole thing back to life in a few days.

No one in the village was allowed to hold personal bearings besides what they’d found outside the village, during search missions, or just perimeter patrol. Anything that wasn’t valuable for the community survival, you could keep. Keith felt like a real human, the ones Allura sometimes showed them in her own video feed, the few old data which hadn’t been corrupted as years passed by.

Keith left the changing room with a groan and a, “Stay. Here.”, before closing the ragged curtain behind him. The shack faced a series of bridges, the only connection to the other side of the metal canyon. Some bridges had fallen off, because of time, or just heavy  _things_ treading on them. It was hard to tell—and Keith knew better than to follow his curiosity. Curious meant dead, sooner than the rest of the group. Curious meant done, and done for good. Pidge was curious, and yet he couldn’t be bothered—Keith didn’t know how he did it.

Pidge was the only thing keeping them curious and open to improvement, to change. It was a hard battle—sometimes not everyone felt the need to find a new path, a solution, an improvement. Pidge, on the other hand, had spent his whole childhood with Allura—learning how to read, how to work with the electric stuff the City swarmed with. He was the only reason they’d been able to replenish their nail-guns, a secure path to the duplication room without the Safeguard noticing. They could come and go, unnoticed. Pidge was working on a better way to move around inside the City, Keith knew, but he still wouldn’t share his project with the rest of them. Only Allura was allowed inside his workspace, and Matt—Pidge’s older brother.

Keith… well, Keith was curious. He was, very much, although he hadn’t been the same since Pidge and Matt’s father. His own father, in a way. Sometimes Pidge would still use him to convince Keith, to let them explore a bit more, map the City a bit more.  _Just a bit more,_ Keith repeated in his own thoughts. Concern nagged at his throat, heavy and solid in his ribcage. He’d left Pidge with that  _thing_ , and he had to tell Matt that he did. Matt would punch him, probably.

Keith ran. The maze of hallways didn’t confuse him. Sometimes home resonated with him, deeper than anything else. Allura tried to teach him, but he didn’t really understand much of it—he preferred following his own instinct, his gut feeling. Going back home was nowadays the only time he’d allow himself to wander and use different paths to see where they’d lead, nowadays. He’d let himself tread carefully on slim bridges and jump from broken ones, when the distance allowed it—he’d end up in dark, wide chambers, wires hanging from the high ceilings, rust eating away some metal panels.

Today was different, today he was glad he knew the fastest way to the village without losing himself in the process. His breath came short after a bit, but he kept pushing, muscles burning and chest stinging. His whole body was tired from the vargas he’d already spent outside. Keith kept pushing, until the path in front of him followed down a steep slope. Keith almost tripped, but caught himself and slid down—hands away from his body to help his balance.

The village came into his vision with a flash of halogen lights. It was almost dinner time, or way past it—Keith couldn’t tell. He jumped the rest of the slope, roll-diving to absorb the fall and standing back up.

* * *

 

Zuru was where he hoped to find her, in her own house, right a few steps above the main terrace platform. Someone greeted him, but he waved them goodbye in a hurry. As soon as he opened the door, he realised how dry his mouth was, how much his muscles screamed in pain and the throbbing underneath his temples.

Old Zuru was sitting next to the only window the small room had to offer, wires dripping down from her back and connecting to machines only Allura knew how to handle. Old Zuru was one of the oldest first colonists, the only one who’d survived so far—her own heritage walked the village with only resemblances to her traits, especially when wrinkles came.

“Keith,” Zuru greeted.

Keith allowed himself to catch his breath. “Zuru, how can someone tell if a human gets infected by the Safeguard?” he cut to the chase.

Zuru’s head turned, she stared directly at him now, concern in her dark grey eyes. “Why would you ask something like that, Keith?”

“We met this-  _thing_ , near the maze. It looked human, but it wasn’t,” Keith explained. “It had a weird black suit all patched up. We attacked before it could and then I told everyone to stand down because it wasn’t  _fighting back_ , and-”

“Keith.”

Keith went silent.

“Take a deep breath, drink some water, and tell me.”

Keith thought about complaining but eventually did as he was told. It took him a bit to sort everything out, get as many details as he could get out. He told her about the way the Shiro-  _thing_ removed every nail from its body as if pain wasn’t his to feel. He told her about Pidge, recklessly removing his helmet to allow Shiro to scan them. Told her the genes Shiro was looking for, and Keith noted how Zuru startled at that, even though Keith didn’t say the whole name. Zuru’s expression grew wide with time, not entirely concerned, but almost surprised. The more Keith told, the more he was sure, Zuru knew something about this. Old Zuru was keeping secrets not even the elders knew of.

“Did this young man have a name?” she asked, something hopeful in her voice.

Keith nodded, still grimacing. “It said its name was Shiro.”

“Oh.”

Keith frowned. “Are you- why are you disappointed?” Confusion rose. Was she waiting for something else?

Zuru sighed, looked Keith in the eyes and then smiled. “So Pidge is with him, and you fear him and the others have been infected,” she summarised.

Keith nodded. “You don’t... look concerned. Do you know this  _thing_?”

Zuru coughed a laugh but eventually shook her head. “No, Keith, but I believe Allura might help you out. She’s the one who taught me everything I know today.”

Keith considered staying, force old Zuru to tell something more, to explain what “everything” meant, why she wasn’t concerned— _why is she disappointed?—_ and then sighed. Allura would’ve been a better source of informations anyway—she didn’t mind explaining, nor keeping secrets.

Keith shifted on his seat, fists unclenching and releasing all the tension he’d accumulated during his report. “Where is she?”

“In the undergrounds.”

* * *

 

Allura was always working on something. She’d been able to help the village throughout its generations. Keith knew she had been human before her consciousness was transcribed to a machine. Allura was what Keith would identify as a   _thing_ , but she was a  _good thing_ rather than a bad one. Allura helped them. Allura didn’t follow the Safeguard order to exterminate humans on sight. Keith wasn’t even sure Allura had any way of harming them, besides with brute force.

Keith didn’t have many memories of Allura beside his childhood ones; although Zuru said she was the one who brought Keith into the village. Allura had saved him, according to Zuru and Sam; she’d brought him back with the scouts after a mission to the cloning room. Keith had been an outsider, and yet nobody had ever treated him differently.

It was Sam who’d explained to a much younger and flustered Keith why he was so different from Katie and Matt, why they still called him brother even though he didn’t look like them at all. It should’ve brought Keith grief, or sadness, to know it—and yet, he was relieved to know. It was like something settled inside of him,—something that made Keith feel inadequate, unfit, unwanted.

When Keith learned about Allura, he was only fourteen deca-phoebes. She’d show herself aboveground every once in a while, only to meet with the elders and help out with specific scout teams who were sent outside the village, the kind of missions that needed more than two quintants to be carried out.

Keith dragged his feet down the steep stairs, dim lights telling him where to go, together with the soft hum of machinery. If the people kept quiet long enough, he could hear the whole village thrumming in the night, as if the metal was alive. It took him time to understand that not everyone could hear it, and not everyone questioned the possibility.

A sharp whirring sound brought Keith back to the present, head peeking out the last corner.

Allura was taller than most of the people from the village. She had dark steel legs with heelless feet. Her body was slim, joints fluid and impeccable. Only her upper body was similar to that of a human, dark synthetic skin and blue eyes, white straight locks framing her face—a graceful touch to her design.

Keith was told she was the one who sketched her own body from a wrecked, old model. Right in the duplication room.

“Keith.”

Allura didn’t flinch, she didn’t even turn to check if it was really him, actually. Keith shifted, uncomfortable. He couldn’t help but swallow down the crippling uneasiness her presence radiated. Which didn’t make much sense. Allura had always been peaceful, a sharp mind dedicated to improvement, to helping the colony.

“Do you know anything on the Safeguard infection?” Keith cut to the chase. The pros of talking with Allura were, he didn’t need to socially introduce anything. She didn’t care if he just wanted to know something, rather than meet her. Keith wasn’t even sure she could  _feel_ emotions like they did anymore.

Allura stopped whatever she was doing—a light blue panel withdrew back between two panels, leaving the room to its white lights.

Allura turned. “It is rather difficult to tell, unfortunately,” she said, monotone. “Have you encountered the Safeguard? These levels should have low importance to the system.”

Keith shook his head, then he grimaced. “I, yes and no. I don’t know to be honest,” he sighed. “There was a thing. I thought it was a Safeguard, but it didn’t attack us on sight.” Shoulder tensing, Keith sucked a breath in. “So I ordered the rest of the guys to stop. Turns out it knew how to speak and wanted to scan us—and you know Pidge, he never does what he’s told if this kind of stuff is involved.” A hard sigh. “And then Lance and Hunk did the same. I’m the only one who didn’t.”

Silence from Allura. Her whole body wasn’t moving, she didn’t need to breathe, and everyone was used to it by now.

“What was his name?”

Keith frowned. “Why? And why do you assume it’s a  _him_? Zuru did it too, what the ruggle is going on?”

Allura didn’t reply. She did, instead, offer Keith a seat—which only meant that Keith had to find something that looked as much like a chair as he could find, and sit on it. Keith crossed his arms, eyebrow raising. He was not having any of this grapevine bullshit.

Allura did something very similar to a sigh. “Did he give you a name, Keith?” she insisted.

Keith’s eyes thinned. “Shiro.”

Allura tilted her head. “Shiro.” As if Keith had heard wrong. “Interesting.”

“What? What’s interesting?” Keith was starting to lose his temper. “What’s going on?”

Allura smiled, sharp but soft. Affable. “You need not worry, he is not a threat to us, nor your friends. I highly doubt he will do anything beside move on, if we do not pique his interest.”

“And why would you know that, exactly?”

“I am not sure exactly, I am but a copy of my original body,” Allura started, “and during the years, some of my files have been corrupted. Still, if you will allow it, I would like to meet this... thing.”

Keith kept quiet. Bringing Allura with him could be helpful—he’d have a way to determine what kind of  _thing_ Shiro was. If it was a low-level threat, or maybe a more advanced Safeguard, one capable of lying and faking just to accomplish a bigger goal. It had happened in the past, someone infected had been used as a teleport for a high-ranking Safeguard to infiltrate their previous village and almost exterminate all of their inhabitants.

On the other hand, bringing Allura with them only to uncover that it was indeed a high-ranking Safeguard, would only mean he’d put the primary source of knowledge and development for the village at risk. Could he do that? For the sake of knowledge?

Once, he would’ve said yes almost instantly. Knowledge or death. There’s nothing more important than knowing, understanding, and building on said understanding. Now he wasn’t so sure. If there were nobody build for, or nothing to build on, what was the point?

“Can you do a backup?” Keith inquired.

Allura nodded. “I regularly update multiple random backups in different stations. There is no worry. If something were to happen to me, I cloned a few empty bodies your people could upload the backups in. I have taught the twins how to.”

Pidge and Matt.

Keith grimaced, mouth twisting. He didn’t like it, but it was their only option. “We leave in four vargas,” he announced.

He should rest, he knew he should, although it was hard—gut twisting anxiety quietly bubbling in the back of his throat. He had to prepare, call Lance and Hunk back so they could do the same. For now, he could only hope.

Hope that Pidge was safe. Hope that neither of Lance or Hunk were infected. Hope that that Shiro-  _thing_ was not there to destroy them all for good, and finish the job the other Safeguard couldn’t.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Welp, next chapter will be Shiro's POV and his (mis)adventures with Pidge ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) dun dun dunnnn
> 
> As always, I'm on [Tumblr](http://hikku.tumblr.com) if you want to freak out with me!! Please do because it helps my stupid brain to hype and then write more stuff jhghjjhghj <3
> 
> Thank you for reading!


	3. Are we the prey?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> FINALLY, I had time and brain juice to write this chapter. Sorry it took so long, between the poor internet connection and personal issues, I wanted to dedicate my full attention to this - hence the smutty, easy OS I've kept myself occupied with lol.
> 
> This chapter is longer than the others since it has finally some turning points, and things get interesting (fingers crossed)
> 
> Thanks to [Pao](https://wonderlandswurst.tumblr.com) for beta reading this with so little anticipation and clearing things up!!

Shiro stared at Pidge as the human rummaged through the mess of their hideout. Shiro had already pinpointed its location, and how to track it down if he ever came back to this level, although he doubted the humans would come here ever again now that a stranger had discovered it. Shiro could still use some safe houses he could recharge inside. Still, data was stored as a cache file, so it would be cleared in a few years when he’d be sure it wouldn’t be of any use.

Pidge had detached some of his suit’s plates and his helmet, and Shiro was slowly inspecting the pieces. Pidge had told him he could look, but not touch, and that was what Shiro did. He tilted his head and examined the inside of Pidge’s helmet. It was completely black, but a quick scan revealed a separate frontal plate which could be turned on.

Shiro didn’t really need to _touch_ in order to connect to the helmet’s comms and get inside its system. The helmet lit up, sequence initialising. The frontal plate flashed with some orange windows and then used some hidden cameras installed on the outer plates. It had a self-sustaining, self-regulating program installed, together with the comms frequency he quickly registered. Shiro could only find the hardware which led to the oxygen valve, now deemed unplugged by system’s scans and non-operational before Pidge abruptly grabbed the helmet from under his eyes.

The helmet shut down.

“How did you-” Pidge frowned as he checked his helmet. “Did _you_ do that?”

Shiro blinked. “Yes.”

“I said no touching,” Pidge said, frown deepening into something less patient and welcoming.

Shiro tilted his head. “I did not touch it,” he quietly stated.

Pidge gave him a look, something Shiro didn’t understand, but could nonetheless interpret. The human wasn’t happy. He wanted answers a bit more specific than the one Shiro had given. Trust. The human was trusting him a great deal right now, so Shiro only found it logical to explain further.

“Touch is not required in order to connect with electronic devices. Besides, I was curious as to how you could see through the frontal plate,” Shiro explained. System reported the background activity, checking in to let Shiro know his arm was healed. Now, only the shoulder was missing, although it wouldn’t be long.

Pidge’s shoulders relaxed, although the uneasiness didn't quite leave his features. “Huh.”

“My arm is finally healed. We may go,” Shiro informed as he tested his limb. It responded quickly, the system only reporting a minor delay in response—a few milliseconds of deviation. Shiro could work with that.

Pidge was examining the arm too, now peeking through the fabric to see the skin and the dried blood on Shiro’s armour. He looked intrigued, brows knitted, lips only partly rippled. The broken lens of his glasses had Shiro tilt his head once more and then pick them from the small metal bridge on Pidge’s nose.

Pidge jumped out of his way—only his glasses stayed steady in Shiro’s hand.

He analysed them, a rough chemical composition helping him understand what he was looking for. Then, he recreated a 3D model and saved it for later.

“Watcha doing there buddy?” Pidge asked, wary.

Shiro returned the glasses. “Your lens is broken, if we could find a duplication station, I might be able to reconstruct one, if not a new pair of glasses.”

“Duplication station? Don’t you mean room?”

Shiro computed for a brief second. “The station is situated in a very large hangar, which might be called a room, yes,” he described. “Although it has never been safe to reach one, as the Safeguard has them under its scrutiny.”

Pidge frowned. “So, you’re not a Safeguard, but you’ve access to the duplication station?” he inquired.

Shiro knew where he was going. “I am no Safeguard, neither a human or Silicon Creature, which means I hold little if no interest to the Safeguard.”

The system initialised System’s mapping and recreated a new, 3D simulation of their possible itineraries. They had little options based on safety and time. Shiro didn’t know if any or no Safeguard at all controlled these levels, yet he wasn’t ready to bet on their complete absence. There would always be a small chance they’d encounter something—someone—so as much as possible, Shiro avoided any tunnel and path that was more likely to be used by the lesser Safeguards as a passage between levels.

Shiro tapped into Pidge’s comms and displayed the routes on his main screen as well. He noticed and ignored how Pidge jumped in surprise when Shiro’s logs popped on his screen. It was amusing and interesting, the way the human squirmed and then calmed down.

Shiro was curious about reactions he didn’t understand, nor would he replicate.

“Seriously, you really need to tell me when you’re gonna do shit like this, okay?” Pidge picked at Shiro’s bicep. “If you scare me in the middle of a stealthy moment, I’ll draw all the attention and we’re gonna be as good as dead.”

Shiro looked Pidge and then kept walking the path he’d chosen.

“Hey!” Pidge protested, following right behind him. “Have you understood anything I’ve told you? Do feel free to let me know, eh!”

Shiro nodded, barely registered his own voice rising in an automatic, “I have understood,” before taking the tunnel on his right. It would lead them through the maze and then up two levels. It was fast, but they’d pass near a few discharged, decommissioned Lookouts.

Shiro took the old visor he’d been holding onto for the past years. It wasn’t at its best and needed repair, but it could still help them get through the section undetected.

“What’s that?”

Pidge’s timing was flawless. Nothing escaped the human’s gaze—but then, it wasn’t like Shiro was keeping secrets his own movements.

“Standard issue visor,” Shiro said, yet he wasn’t sure. It was all hypothesis and conjectures. “I believe it was commissioned by the Safeguard. It should have the latest permits to help us through any possible active Lookout.”

“The creepy eyes?”

Shiro nodded, although “creepy” wasn’t exactly in his own vocabulary. Shiro had never felt creeps shiver through his spine, nor did he feel uneasiness, and yet these concepts were somehow familiar in a distant, deeper sense his understanding could help him with.

“That’s why you’re still alive and, dunno, running around the City?” Pidge asked.

Shiro nodded. “I come from the upper levels, the visor has helped me avoid any sort of detection by the Lookouts,” he explained. “Still, if we do encounter Safeguards, they will be able to visually assert our nature.”

“Which means we’ll have to run.”

Shiro’s eyebrow quirked a small curve upwards.

“We… won’t run?” Pidge’s voice was, weirdly enough, more than enough for Shiro’s software to interpret his tone.

Shiro nodded, affirmative. They shouldn’t run. “Just make sure you stay behind me,” he told.

* * *

Some of the stairs Shiro came from were collapsed. Lucky for him, he’d taken the possibility into consideration and quickly recalculated a new route. Pidge was silent for most of the time, but he had been asking questions Shiro didn’t fully comprehend—or rather, didn’t fully comprehend their meaning or purpose.

“Are those piercings?” Pidge had asked.

“What exactly?” Shiro had inquired, eyes turning ever so slightly.

At that, Pidge had extended an arm and pointed at Shiro’s ears with his index finger. “Those on your earlobe and the rest of the cartilage,” he’d explained.

Shiro had barely dedicated it a thought, but he did touch his ear to find small, round, metal objects poking out of his skin. Maybe Shiro had known weird at that moment, as he’d never questioned their existence. They just had been there since he’d woken up.

“Touchy topic?” Pidge had guessed.

Shiro had shaken his head.

The silence had lasted exactly 30.4643 seconds. Then, Pidge was onto the next curiosity. His visor, how did it work? Why was he able to heal? Where did he come from? What were the NTG? Why would humans have them? How come Shiro was all alone? Wouldn’t it better to look for NTG with bigger numbers? Where there any more Shiro’s? And, more importantly, if Shiro was neither Safeguard, human, or Silicon Creature, what in the quiznack was he?

Questions Shiro only had vague answers to.

He only knew what his mind allowed him to remember—what System had stored and wasn’t corrupted, which was very little. It also made Pidge huff in frustration and comment something snarky, something witty, and eventually give up on chasing after some deeper truth of Shiro’s quest.

The bridges squeaked and creaked underneath both their feet. They were old—older than anything else. The lower the City was, the older its materials were. Lower levels were considered unstable, therefore additionally dangerous for any life form. The Safeguard knew that and had decided to let the casualties do their job. Pidge had already murmured something about not being allowed this far away from their homes, and Shiro had told him he could wait for him at the hideout if he was scared—scared he wouldn’t make it, or that Shiro would turn his back on him.

The City was silent around them, any kind of sound was either amplified until its very edges, or died within a few feet. It all depended on which materials you were surrounded with. Sometimes the scans detected bits of concrete, sometimes synthetics materials—the ones the Safeguard used to clone more of them when needed, and sometimes it was just naked metal.

The only places Shiro had found synthetic materials was near the Lookouts—the whole structures were surrounded by panels they could connect with. Permissions usually requested a few milliseconds, before the crooked dolls emerged from the panels and gave their chase.

 “There,” Shiro pointed.

It was just a few hundreds of feet above and to their left: a giant mass of glass eyes. Intelligent cameras pointed in any directions, any Lookout had at least fifty. They moved in concentric lines, but they could also gather or shift lines. Shiro had seen them moving in pretty much any direction on the far edges of the structure, in a position where they could scout almost a flat angle all around them.

Pidge froze behind him, jumped back to safety behind the wall they had just crossed. “Are you crazy?!” he hissed.

Shiro didn’t stop moving. “It will not reactivate,” he said. “I already have passed through here.”

His scans too didn’t find anything else but emptiness and walls. There was no sign of electrical activity in nearly eight miles. He suspected it would’ve stayed that way until they reached the upper level.

Shiro crossed the bridge and waited for Pidge to test his words out and follow him. They would be late on the timetable. Pidge, eventually, jumped rather than walked and was right next to Shiro. “I hope you know what you’re doing, robo-dude,” he snapped quietly.

“I do.”

The upper level could only be reached by steep stairs along the main wall. They were narrow and crumbled at some parts, with no handrail most of the time. Shiro kept his speed steady, but Pidge had more than a few issues along the way. It was clear the human couldn’t ignore the overhang beneath them—how light didn’t reach the lower levels as it clearly felt down there.

Shiro stopped and offered Pidge his hand as soon as they reached a small cavity into the steep wall, one of what should’ve been used to let others pass and then move along.

“Come,” he offered. “I will carry you.”

Pidge stared for a solid minute, Shiro couldn’t see nor know what was going on behind his helmet. All he could see were the frontal plates shifting, adjusting the cameras to check their surroundings. Pidge didn’t even need to turn, he could just move his eyes—and the cameras would follow. Which meant…

Shiro tapped into the comms once more, System looking for anything that might help him with movement detection, and he did find it. Pidge’s face appeared in a tiny video-feed screen at the left corner of his vision. He looked wary, as always, but he wasn’t as hostile as Shiro had seen him four hours before.

“I will not drop you,” he reassured, and yet his voice didn’t bend to his will. Shiro was disappointed.

Pidge huffed. “Yeah, you better not, or I’ll drag you down with me,” he threatened.

Shiro took it as a small victory. He turned and kneeled in front of Pidge, helped him on his back and then stood back up, steadying himself. System calculated his new gravity centre, and Shiro adjusted to it. They wouldn’t fall unless the stairs did.

Shiro resumed the climb.

He sped up just enough, so they would make up for the time loss Pidge’s interruptions got them.

Pidge clung to his shoulders, legs tightening their grip on Shiro’s waist. It was hard to balance himself _and_ a living, moving creature. System did its best to adjust to the movements, the way Pidge would shy away from the abyss, or how he would slightly jump and duck whenever he believed Shiro would slip over the edge.

Eventually, Shiro had to sacrifice some of their speed in order to keep up with Pidge’s sudden movements.

He was quite annoyed.

The Lookout, on the other hand, was something Pidge had clearly never gotten close to because as soon as he realised they were heading right underneath it, he shrieked and tried to convince Shiro to go back. It was massive, a huge metal spheroid bulge on the edge of the main wall—the big and thick ones that separated each City sector into smaller mazes.

“Shit, it’s gonna see us! It’s decommissioned, but they still have low-power functions! Shiro turn back!”

Shiro didn’t turn back.

“Shiro!” Pidge’s voice was back to a hiss. “Fuck, fuck, _fuck!_ You’re gonna get us killed!”

“I told you I came this way,” Shiro answered, voice low. “Stop moving or you _will_ attract unwanted attention.”

That looked like it did the trick. Pidge froze and, if Shiro wasn’t as sturdy as he was, he would’ve probably thought that Pidge was trying to choke him. Pidge must’ve realised too because after a few minutes he released the grip and apologised.

Shiro kept quiet as he moved. He knew the visor had a purpose, to fool the Safeguard into thinking he was one of them, that he had permission to be where he was. Still, Shiro has never tried to juggle, speak, or stay in front of a Lookout for more than a few seconds. He’d never stayed in the same place for more than a few hours, and even then, he made sure he was tucked away in a relatively safe place.

The Lookout didn’t move its dim blue cameras, staying dead and grey in the middle. Nothing moved, nothing changed. Pidge didn’t dare move, but Shiro kept a watchful eye on the machine, he made sure the visor circled his neck, light pulsing a dim azure every few seconds.

The stairs creaked, but nothing happened.

Lookouts were usually attracted by movement, rather than sound.

Shiro kept his speed steady until they were up and around the edge of the main walls.

“Woah,” Pidge exhaled, shifting on Shiro until he dropped on the ground. “What’s that?”

Shiro wasn’t new to the vision—the City expanded as far as the eye could see. It was massive and quiet. No humming machinery, no twirling dust. Every sector was orderly divided by the abyss, the main walls—and roofs, really—shaped as large bits of cuboids, or at least that’s what Shiro assumed they’d be. It was like a huge, metal Kubrick cube. Where that name came from, Shiro wasn’t sure. It was just in his vocabulary array.

At its edges—if there were any—hot-white shading up to bluish lights lit up the whole sectors. Shiro knew it kept growing and expanding, and that nobody could ever reach the end of it. It was a sharp thing, something that could fend the eyes off, and at the same time caught them in an intricate game of smaller sections haphazardly. A Builder lazily rummaged through far away sectors, a giant metal beast, and one of the few that didn’t mind visitors or passengers. They were programmed to build, and they had never stopped—not even the Safeguard minded them, as they wouldn’t be anything but uninterested.

Only out of necessity had Shiro seen one of the builders transform into a huge, crooked doll, ready to blast Shiro into the lower levels and send him flying against a wall.

It was the only time he had used his GBE at two power bars.

 Pidge shivered behind him. “What is this place?” he asked.

Shiro only waited so much before walking towards the inner part of the main walls. Gravity itself could shift inside the sections, it was unwarranted and unprompted. The City had stopped making sense to Shiro a long time ago. “The upper levels. Stay sharp, the Safeguard is more active here,” he warned.

The small video-feed in the corner of Shiro’s eyes showed Pidge’s face, concerned and wary, cameras shifting the frontal plates and zooming in on random places, scouting for signs of the Safeguards. “There’s more?” he asked. “I know our village came from above.”

“The next area is a buffer towards the Megastructure,” he explained. “The higher you go, the more dangerous it gets. The Megastructure is impenetrable without proper means.”

Pidge looked up at the faraway ceiling above them. Shiro knew a way to breach the upper levels, but it was dangerous for him. It would’ve been impossible for any human. “How do you know this?”

Shiro shrugged.

“Include this too in the reports, thanks?”

Shiro nodded.

In front of them, the sector’s main walls grew into a heap of metal rods and panels. Some of them blended together, like something burned and melted them in place. It was a rough idea of a stepladder. Something Shiro had found by luck, and lots of wasted time. He couldn’t just drop in the lower levels without taking a whole week worth of repairs.

“How much higher up do we have to go? Is this safe?”

Shiro stopped, one hand on the stepladder. “I have not said it would be,” he pointed out. “If you need extra hardware space, we need to hunt for it, and I did come across something, in the upper level.”

“Something? You’re not even sure?”

Shiro confirmed, “I cannot be sure, it could be a Safeguard storehouse.”

Pidge stopped on his tracks. “Quiznack,” he cursed.

Shiro took a few seconds to scout the area. Still no sign of electric impulses. They hadn’t tipped any alarm, nothing was coming for them—yet. “Do you wish the files or not?” Shiro pressed.

The video-feed showed a torn Pidge, eyes darting at both his sides, and then he turned back to check the way they came from, the Lookout still dead and unmoving. The longer they waited in the same place, the riskier it became.

“Alright, alright! But if there’s even a slight chance we might encounter the Safeguard, we get out of here, alright?” Pidge finally decided.

Shiro was already on the stepladder as soon as the first two words escaped Pidge’s mouth. “I agree,” he replied and then proceeded to climb.

* * *

T he upper levels were cold and quiet. Shiro had to remove the heavy trapdoor he’d come through a few days earlier. It was heavy and loud, but Shiro was quick and left it open for Pidge to come through. He didn’t touch it afterwards. It was better to leave one way out if they needed to escape.

The corridor was claustrophobic in comparison to the open space they’d been in. Shiro could barely stand without having to crouch. Pidge, on the other hand, fit perfectly in it due to his tiny stature. They both scouted the area, and Shiro noticed how Pidge had one hand on his nail-shooter, as they called it.

Shiro grimaced at the interference that ran through this sector, his visor glitching throughout the whole scan. System didn’t report anything out of the ordinary, but the same anomaly he’d found a few days before. Anything electrical wasn’t of his interest, which meant he wasn’t going near the thing.

Now, though, it had become trade material. Shiro’s files in exchange for a scan of their whole village. He needed those, as scarce as humans had been in his journey—scarcer than his logs anticipated. On the other hand, the Silicon Creatures had taken over with time, taking possession of even entire sectors far away to the West.

Shiro made way.

The silence was something Shiro was used to. Pidge, on the other hand, looked increasingly tense by the second. “Five-hundred meters from here,” Shiro announced the small sequence of numbers appearing on his vision.

Pidge hissed something Shiro didn’t fully comprehend, and only opted to ignore.

“Four hundred.”

Pidge grunted.

“Two hundred and fift-”

Pidge elbowed him. “Stop counting down! You’re annoying!”

Shiro stared for a brief second, and then he tapped into Pidge’s systems and shared the numbers on his screen. Hopefully Pidge understood meters as he understood hours—although Shiro wasn’t as much as hopeful. Hope wasn’t something built in his program, or that he knew of.

The interference grew stronger every time they got close. To what, Shiro had yet to find out. After some time, he had to turn off his own visor and let it run in background to be able to see anything.

Something grabbed at his right ankle.

He stopped mid-step, GBE in hand and now pointed to the head of whatever must’ve been some kind of creature _._ Pidge didn’t stop. He clearly hadn’t noticed.

“Take me with you,” the creature said, it had not a face. Not really, at least. Shiro could still make out its features, two crude eyeball-shaped cameras stuck out of what must’ve been eye sockets. The rest of it was mostly metal structures melted into black goo. Silicon life.

Pidge heard it, and Shiro had only a small window of time to reach for Pidge's nail-shooter, before it ejected the projectile. It shot right through the creature’s shoulder.

Pidge pulled the nail-shooter out of Shiro’s hand. “What the shit?!”

Shiro hushed Pidge. “Something will hear you,” he warned.

Pidge gulped down and pulled the nail-shooter out of Shiro’s grasp. He let go, and Pidge holstered it on his back. “What is that _thing_ Shiro?” he pressed.

“Take me. With you,” the creature said.

Shiro kneeled next to it. Innocuous thing, and yet they were so much taller than him. Shiro wondered how it got here. “Do you have spare hardware memory?” he asked.

The creature only moved its eyes—to Shiro, and then on Pidge, on whom they stayed. “Computing,” it said.

“Shiro what are you doing? Aren’t we close to the thing you were talking about?”

Shiro tilted his head, readied the port on the back of his neck for incoming data, possibly infected ones. System initialised deep search protocols. He didn’t reply.

“Thirty-two terabytes of hardware space. Only three have been used. I should be lightweight,” it said, as if hardware space worried Shiro. “Please, take me with you.”

System initialised analysis. It searched through what was left of the creature’s body, its biocomponents, until it found the power cells, and what was left of the creature’s hardware. There were four of them in total.

“In exchange for your hardware,” Shiro accepted, and the creature let out a metallic sound.

Shiro reached out right behind the creature’s head, what was left of its neck, until he could find the male cable port. He dragged it to his own female port and connected. Data transfer took only a few seconds. The creature’s eyes went dark, the same glassy grey. System deep-searched everything, scanning and discarding, quarantining, or downright erasing anything that wasn’t the creature.

It didn’t take long.

“What the fuck did you do?!” Pidge asked.

Shiro didn’t turn to check on him. The video-feed was up again, glitching, but still visible. Pidge didn’t look happy. “I granted its wishes,” he said. “It is not the first time this happened. A lot of creatures cannot walk on their own.”

“And you _bring_ those with you?! Are you crazy?”

Shiro shrugged. “It is not essential to my interests, although it does help my mission,” he explained. “They have mapped entire sections of the City, any uncorrupted video-feed is helpful to track down possible Net Terminal Genes bearers’ location.”

“So you, what, actually kill them for their information?”

Shiro was already working the chest open, cut through some of the support structures to get a better access. “They do maintain their individuality. I have a lot of space, I am merely another means to a world,” he said. “They can witness and recreate anything my 3D mapping gets out of their feed… Less the Safeguard.”

System stopped any analysis, put everything in background when its sensors detected electric activity not far from them.

Shiro cut the whole torso, prying it away from where it was stuck, and pulled out with a firm shove all the processors and hardware. Some of the metal rods fell on the ground.

“Shiro!” Pidge hushed.

“Run,” he instructed, throwing the whole pile of components and cables at him.

Pidge didn’t question it—smart boy. He lunged and ran to where he and Shiro had come from. Shiro was behind him, GBE in hand. “Where to?” Pidge said, dropping down the trapdoor and catching the stepladder only by the handle.

“To the edge,” Shiro said through Pidge’s comms. “Do not engage,” he added, and then closed the trapdoor behind Pidge.

“Wait! What are you doing?!” Pidge shouted in his comms.

Shiro flinched, turning towards the tunnel and pointing the GBE towards it. “They do not know how many of us are there. If they can converge to my location, I can take them down,” he read his own train of thoughts out loud.

It was tiring, explaining rather than acting.

“You’re crazy! They’re gonna kill y-”

Shiro closed his comms. He couldn’t be bothered right now.

The GBE only took a few seconds to charge its first bar of power, just in time for Shiro to see the crooked dolls swarming inside of the tunnel. There were tons of them, bright red eyes and black joints covered by smooth, white bits of armour. Their faces had the same dead expression, relaxed features and sharp noses, straight lines sketching their thin lips. Their limbs moved with mechanical precision, wrong joints, wrong movements—unnatural, and yet they made the City and the Megastructure, their own home—somewhere only they were allowed to live in. They walked on all fours, spine aligned with sharp spikes to impale whatever would try and attack them from above

Unfortunate, considering the only way to destroy them was through the head. Either cut it off or pierce through it.

Shiro didn’t do any of that.

He waited quietly for them to come.

When the Safeguard was within meters from him, Shiro shot the GBE.

It wasn’t loud. It wasn’t flashy and pretty. In a millisecond, where the GBE had been pointed, nothing stood in its way. It drilled a hole inside the tunnel and a new tunnel even where there wasn’t supposed to be one, right through most of the Safeguard—wherever they’d come from. Shiro braced for recoil, felt his arm stiff and System alerting him of minor damage sustained.

In front of him, bits and limbs of dolls fell on the ground, edges hot red where they’d been melted out of existence, some of them down the big chunks of walls the GBE had eaten away. In the distance, the projectile exploded and destroyed a whole piece of the sector. It was red and raw, eating away everything. It knew nothing but destruction.

It was its purpose.

Shiro finally opened the trapdoor and dropped down on the stepladder. He grabbed the ladder where it connected with the upper level and pushed. It creaked and whined underneath Shiro’s pressure until it gave in and broke. Shiro dropped down, letting gravity drag him until he was halfway. The steps gave in, but he grabbed onto the next ones until it held and Shiro found a grip.

In the corner of his eyes, he could see Pidge already on the ground, now staring blindly at the destruction Shiro had wreaked in the upper level.

His comms alerted him of an incoming transmission. Shiro opened them.

Pidge’s voice was incredulous at best. “Was- Was that you?”

Shiro only replied with a quick, “Yes,” and was back on the stepladder. Above him, System warned more crooked dolls were incoming. Shiro tore the fragile structure until it fell apart and down to the main walls of the lower levels.

It came down crashing, another roar that lost itself in the immense empty space the buffer was.

Shiro climbed down hastily, jumping to Pidge once he was only ten meters away from him, and landed on his knees. Pidge was still staring, only distracted by something crashing down right next to them.

It was one of the Safeguard, now broken and scattered on the ground. Shiro distractedly noted how they were all falling down the trapdoor and the other holes the GBE had created in the upper level.

“Come,” Shiro prompted, grabbing Pidge and hauling him on his back.

“Hey! Put me down!” Pidge complained but didn’t really struggle through.

Shiro was only being logical, and they both couldn’t afford any more delays. Shiro stalked towards the edge of the main walls, and then he was running, muscles pushing through and gaining speed, momentum.

Pidge screamed but held tight onto Shiro and the heap of biocomponents Shiro had entrusted him with.

Then, once System had computed the best route for them, Shiro jumped.

* * *

Two hours left.

They only had two hours before the other humans would be at their hideout, looking for them, and finding Shiro and Pidge were still out. System told him they would’ve reached the hideout in nothing less than three hours and forty-six minutes.

Pidge knew it too.

System also estimated that Shiro’s legs would be repaired in two hours.

Until then, Shiro had a bad limp and couldn’t quite place pressure on his heels. It wasn’t a problem, not in terms of pain. It only meant he needed to focus most on his balance, rather than fall down every time he misstepped.

Pidge had offered to carry him, only to find out how much heavier Shiro was compared to himself.

“What are you made of?” Pidge had asked, and then pushed a hand on Shiro’s lips as soon as Shiro had started listing his chemical composition. The ones he knew of, at least. “Nope, just put it in the file,” he’d said.

Now they were walking, somewhere in the lower levels, probably way off the track that Shiro had wished for, but alive and well.

The Safeguard had deemed them dead, or near that very fate, since System had notified Shiro of their disappearance.

“So, we got the thing,” Pidge exhaled. The video-feed showed his face, something weary on the human’s features, and then disbelief, something that quickly became excitement. “Dude, that was _so_ cool! How’d you do it?”

Shiro drew the GBE out of its holster, handed it to Pidge.

“What’s this?”

Shiro shrugged. “A Gravitational Beam Emitter,” he said.

“Let me guess, you know nothing about this one too,” Pidge said.

Shiro nodded.

“Is there anything you actually know?”

Shiro stared at Pidge, head tilted. “I do not understand the question,” he said.

Pidge rolled his eyes in Shiro’s video-feed. “Of course you wouldn’t. You sound like Allura,” he commented.

Allura.

Shiro frowned slightly. “Who is Allura?” he inquired.

“She’s, like, a _thing_ like you. She talks robot, but she looks human. Doesn’t wanna kill us like you. All the stuff one would deem cool these deca-phoebes,” Pidge said.

Pidge… talked. A lot. Still, Shiro didn’t know who or what this Allura was, or why she was in the company of humans. Didn’t she have a purpose too? Was she different from Shiro?

“We will be late to your companions’ reunion,” Shiro said instead.

Pidge sighed. “Yeah, I know. Keith’s gonna freak out, but don’t worry. I’ve got a plan.”

Shiro didn’t reply. On the other hand, he pointed at the components they’d salvaged from the creature hours ago. “Have you found the hardware?” he asked.

“Oh! Yeah, sure,” Pidge stopped playing with the processors and dragged one of his small bags until it untangled from his belt—threw it at Shiro.

Shiro grabbed it. “I will begin a data transfer as soon as I have a copy of the files,” he said.

Then, he plugged into the first hardware and factory-reset it. System added the process in the background, another clock that ticked slowly as it proceeded. Three-point-twenty hours to end the full process—cloning the files, transferring them, and then encrypting it all.

Pidge didn’t shut up, not even one second. Shiro found himself not disliking his presence entirely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OOF I hope that was interesting? And hopefully stirred things up??
> 
> More trouble to come in the next chapter, and our fave boys stranded (we been known, ems, shut up) in this cruel place ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) who knows what'll happen.
> 
> As always, I'm on [Tumblr](http://emsawards.tumblr.com) if you wanna freak out with me, inbox & DMs are always open <3 thank you for reading so far, leaving kudos and/or commenting!! Ily djksdjksjksd
> 
> See you folks in the next one <3


	4. It ends with a start

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've never written so much in my entire life. A _huge_ thank you to everyone who's reading and leaves kudos / comments. You guys really make my day and help me out with all the writing.
> 
> Chapter 5 is almost done too, in the meantime, enjoy some angsty survival!!
> 
> This chapter's has been beta-read by 

Allura was already heading to Lance and Hunk to make sure they hadn’t been infected. As for Keith, Keith was looking for Matt everywhere, and only ran into him a one vargas later.

Matt had tackled Keith, loud as always, only to say, “Hey! Been looking for you since you arrived, where’ve you been?”

“To, uhm, with Allura,” Keith had replied.

When Matt asked him where Pidge was, Keith had spilled the whole story a bit fearfully and wholly apologetically. He knew how much Pidge meant to Matt, him and his mother were Matt’s only family left—and Keith didn’t want to be responsible for any more loss.

“I’m coming with you,” Matt said, snapping Keith back to focus.

Keith was… not expecting that. Or, well, he was—but not after a solid lecture on what he’d been thinking, to leave Matt’s brother with that  _ thing _ and come back to the village.

Keith blinked. “Absolutely not,” he declared. “I’ve already put your brother in danger, I won’t put you too-”

“That’s right, I’m putting myself whenever the fuck I want—and I’m going to meet Pidge with you, if you don’t trust this  _ thing _ to keep him safe,” Matt snapped back.

Keith considered arguing. He could waste precious time or agree with Matt and have one more person to fight the  _ thing _ if things gone wrong. Eventually, Keith sighed and released the tension in his fists. “Alright, but we’re leaving in one vargas,” he said.

Matt nodded and moved. “See ya at the shack in thirty doboshes!”

Keith waved at him and turned. He was to reach Allura and the others, update them, and then leave. They’d be early, but Keith didn’t trust the  _ thing _ to come back in time, or maybe come back at all. He needed to have a plan in case things went south, which meant having everyone ready and debriefed as soon as possible.

* * *

Keith kicked the worn-out wall with a grunt. “Fuck!”

Pidge wasn’t there. They hadn’t followed up with the plan—maybe that was Shiro’s plan all along—and waited inside the hideout for the ticks to hit the mark. Nothing. Shiro and Pidge hadn’t shown up—and Keith was restless. Matt and Allura were scouting the place still, while Hunk and Lance kept an eye on the hallways.

The City was silent, more silent than usual. It sent shivers down Keith’s spine. Something was wrong, he could feel it deep down inside of him. Something had happened and now the City knew, the City would’ve tried to kill them.

Lance put a hand on Keith’s shoulder. “Calm down, it hasn’t even passed one vargas, maybe they’re late, maybe-”

“Uh, I hate to be the voice of reason, but- maybe they’re late on purpose?” Hunk said. “I mean, not late, maybe Shiro wasn’t planning on coming back any time soon? What if it was like, y’know, like that other time they got in? We should alert the village, just in case.”

“There is no reason why you sould, Hunk,” Allura interjected. “I believe Shiro was not programmed to harm humans, the way he had approached you is more than proof.”

Keith was awfully close to kicking another wall. “How would you know? Didn’t another Safeguard get into the village and nearly killed off all of us all those deca-phoebes ago?”

Allura nodded. “And yet here the village stands, alive thanks to one of the  _ things _ —as you call it—you identify Shiro as. This much I know.”

Hunk nodded. “Old Zuru did say something about it, in her stories,” he noted.

“Wasn’t Old Zuru the one who gave me and Pidge that broken thing?” Matt asked. “She said it used to help them move beyond the Lookouts, but we’ve never been able to make it work. It’s severely damaged.”

Keith frowned. He had no idea what they were talking about.

“That’s how we got to the duplication room in the first place, and sabotaged its security,” he said. “But then it got crushed during the scouting missions, and we had to send a whole hunting party to take it back.”

“Whatever, how’s that related to this  _ thing _ ?” Keith snapped.

Allura answered for Matt. “I believe Zuru said it was one of them who gave it to her—‘sacrificed’ was the term employed, if I remember correctly.”

Hunk raised his hand. “So what do we do? We wait for them? Go after them? What if they’re dead?”

Keith shook his head. “If they’re dead, going after them could only draw more Safeguard in the lower levels—makes them useless. If we don’t, and they need our help though…”

“We basically let them die,” Lance finished the thought.

“So what do we do?” Keith turned to look at Matt. 

Matt stared at them, Keith was leaving the decision to him. He’d let Matt do it—and they would’ve respected it.

Everyone turned to Matt, a quiet settled over the low and constant bickering.

Matt tapped a few times on his nail-shooter, a grimace on his face. Then, he took a deep breath and relaxed his shoulders, eyes back on everyone. “We go look for them.”

* * *

They decided to keep together. Matt told Keith how he and Pidge had found out a way to not lose themselves in the mazes. They were small signs, really, something he and Pidge had mapped out throughout all their scouting and patrolling. It would be little things—Pidge would’ve left some traces, according to Matt.

It was true.

Slowly, Keith noticed them too—there were scratches, near other scratches, only whatever did it had a clear pattern, and Pidge’s were never,  _ wrong. _

The hum of the City grew slowly stronger, clearer. Keith had never ventured this far into the mazes—didn’t dare to. Sometimes, in his dreams, it felt like the City sung to him. Wicked and cruel, cold like everything else around them.

They lost track of the signs after a few doboshes, and then found them again. Matt was quick to judge whenever they’d chosen the wrong path—made their way back with frustration and took the second option.

Lance couldn’t keep quiet. Someone had to shut him up regularly, which usually was Keith, or Matt himself.  _ Especially _ if he dragged Hunk into the conversation.

Hunk was easily impressed, and yet Keith knew he was the bravest of them. To be out here, instead of cowering in his house with the simplest excuse—he was a good cook, not a warrior—would’ve been the best idea. Instead, here he was with Keith and the others, trying his damn best to be useful to the team.

Keith liked Hunk.

Definitely not because he’d found comfort between his arms more than with anyone else in the village, or because Hunk got Keith’s awkwardness around people—didn’t judge him for it. Talking to Hunk was the easiest thing he could think of.

Keith liked to think of Hunk as a good friend.

Something he thought he’d only have in Matt and Pidge.

“Where in the ruggle was Pidge going?” Hunk exhales once they reach the end of the maze.

Keith’s heart dropped significantly when he saw the overhang. The hallway just stopped, left just enough space for one person to walk on the edge—no handholds, no railings. It was unsettling. Yet, just about on the other side of the narrow path, there was another scratch—Keith zoomed in on it, shared the video-feed with everyone else.

“Fuck Pidge, where did you go?” Matt exhaled through their comms.

Everyone’s face was just about crammed up in the corner of Keith’s visor, overlapping until someone spoke and their video was highlighted, with no transparency. Matt was concerned.

Keith took his suit’s grapple and dug it in the first layer he could find, attached it to it and pulled a few times. It would hold, hopefully just enough for him to save himself, were he to fall.

“Let’s go,” Keith ordered, and got his back right against the steep wall. He didn’t look down, tension crippling and nagging at his insides. Down there through the cracks, laid whatever hummed and broke Keith’s quiet nights.

On the other side, Keith drew in a breath in of relief. It was a short passage, but Keith had to take his time with every step. He tensed the cable, so everyone could at least hold onto something while they walked over. Matt was the first to jump to safety, then Allura, and Lance. Hunk was still staring at the narrow ledge.

“Uh, are you guys sure?” he asked. “What if I’m too big? You’re all so slim, and-”

“Tie Keith’s grapple around you, Hunk, Allura’s gonna catch you if you fall,” Matt interrupted.

Hunk swallowed, his video-feed showing nothing but sweat drops on his forehead. “Alright, okay, here I come.”

Allura took Keith’s cable and circled it around her hands. She was the strongest between all of them, and Keith very well knew.

Hunk walked slower than usual, much slower than everyone else. Yet, he came through fine—heavy breaths and heart-rate spiking like crazy.

“Alright guys, we’re taking a break,” Keith declared.

Hunk met him with a grateful smile. “Oh, thank you, I need to breathe.”

They found a nook they could set up camp. Keith hadn’t eaten much in the whole eight vargas they’d been out—too preoccupied with organising everything and being ready to leave. They weren’t exactly hidden, so everyone kept their frontal plates up—never removing the helmet.

Water and whatever the yellow-brownish stuff the village had been feeding off for ages. It tasted delicious, and Allura did say a few words nobody understood. Like  _ tomayto sooce _ and  _ garleek, _ Keith didn’t really know. It hardly mattered, as nobody knew how to read or write as well. It was an ancient thing, like their history.

Zuru told them humans did invent everything Allura was able to read—told them that Allura used to be human, a long time ago. How a human became a  _ thing _ , Keith couldn’t comprehend. But it happened, and now she was immortal just like the City was.

The silence stretched out between them. It was only standard procedure to not speak during camp, only if strictly necessary. Nobody wanted to attract unwanted attention

It was then that Keith realised. Everything was silent. No hum, no machinery, nothing.

He closed his frontal plate and raised his head to peek outside the nook’s walls, eyes on the dark corridor the crevasse formed—tall and uncrossable.

“Something’s wrong,” he whispered through their comms.

Everyone moved at that, frontal plates snapping back in position and cameras adjusting accordingly. In a matter of seconds, everyone’s nail-shooters were out and ready.

“What is it?” Matt asked.

Keith crouched, finger ready on the trigger. He couldn’t  _ see _ anything wrong—which was most disturbing. The City was as dark and cold as it’d always been, and yet something else nagged at his mind. Something that shouted at his instincts to move and do it quickly.

He silently gestured everyone to get up and move.

The new ledge was wider, but Keith knew better than to trust it. The panels might break, or maybe shift, they could end up over the edge in a matter of seconds, and nobody would’ve known what happened.

“Over there,” Matt pointed, a door carved in the middle of nothing. The metalwork was jagged at the edges, and it slid and closed behind them swiftly. Only an empty window gave access to the outside, yet part of the roof had fallen off and it was now impossible to use it for anything.

Keith didn’t need to give instruction, everyone knew very well what to do in order to hide. He activated his suit’s soundproofing and crouched in the dark corner by the window. He pointed his cameras towards the window and took a deep breath in. They went radio silent.

Then, he saw it—one of the dolls with white masks and red eyes—it was just above them, black nails digging in the concrete as it crawled down through the steep walls. Something was wrong, though. Its talons were missing, like something had cut them off with something sharp.

What could be sharper than the Safeguard’s armour?

Their nails barely scratched the surface if they lost speed.

The doll was…  _ limping. _ Keith’s eyes thinned, his cameras zoomed in on it. It was missing a leg. Keith leaned in, tried to get a better view, but a hand reached for him and dragged him back in place. Allura was there, shaking her head, empty blue eyes with a silent warning.

Even if the Safeguard was damaged, it could still kill every single one of them.

Keith held his hand still, the order clear,  _ hold position, _ and checked the window.

The doll was nowhere to be seen. Keith opened his sound channel, listened to his surroundings. He could still hear it—claws scratching and screeching where they didn’t grab properly onto the metal. It was close, and it was going in their opposite direction—Keith was suddenly relieved he’d moved fast enough.

They could’ve met the Safeguard right inside that narrow ledge. Then, they would’ve all been screwed.

Something was definitely wrong, though. The dolls never moved alone, and this one was severely damaged. Keith frowned, checked in with his cameras only to find the doll right in front of the door they came through. It turned, and Keith barely made it back in the shadows before the doll reached for the window.

It got blocked off by the crumbled-down ceiling and had to back off. Long claws ticked on the windowsill. It was unnerving, and Keith was ready to give the order—to engage and hope to kill it before it called to more Safeguard.

Right then, the doll backed away and started crawling. Its body was much bigger than a human’s, they were specifically made to hunt down and kill even the bigger humans—Keith wasn’t sure if it should’ve been flattering or rather discouraging.

He counted the steps, before relaxing and opening comms. “It’s gone,” he whispered with a shaky breath. “But it was going up, which means we can’t get out or it’s gonna hear us and come right back.”

They were trapped inside.

Everyone looked at each other.

“Shit, shit, what do we do now?” Lance asked. “We’re supposed to find Pidge, damn it!”

Keith forced his body to relax. “It was badly damaged, maybe it’s going back to wherever they go when-”

“Badly damaged? Who did it? How?” Hunk voiced Keith’s thoughts.

Yet, Keith didn’t have an answer.

“Wait, that Shiro- _ thing, _ you said he was like Allura,” Hunk stuttered, “and Allura—no offense—but you’re like a Safeguard. I mean, like a good-good Safeguard.”

“None taken, Hunk.” Allura smiled, cold. “But you are right, I am built with the same materials Safeguards usually are built with.”

“So, correct me if I’m wrong, could you like- like take down those? If you had the proper means?”

Allura nodded without hesitation. “I may, yes. Although I do not have combat protocols, that I am aware of. I was a scientist, not a soldier.”

Keith lowered his gaze. “What if you were?” he asked. “I mean, what if the  _ thing  _ was a soldier? You guys look the same, talk the same, and help humans.”

Could it be?

“It might be, as it might not,” Allura said. “We may never know—the City is big; all kinds of creatures inhabit it. There are a lot who slip under the control of the Safeguard.”

Keith was about to say something more when a loud noise snapped all of them to focus. Rubble fell down the collapsed wall, half of it was still standing, although Keith could see what had caused the turmoil.

Black clawed fingers were stuck in a hole, two floors above, and were now trying to get free. The doll hissed, its voice mechanical and cutting.

“Why  is it in here?!” Hunk gasped. “What is it doing?”

Keith swore. “Move! Where it can’t see us,” he instructed, walking under the still standing ceiling.

“What if it’s already seen us? Huh?” Lance hissed in the comms.

“It would have attacked,” Allura provided, as cold as ever.

Lance groaned, as did Hunk.

“Shut up and concentrate,” Keith ordered. “We have to take it down. If we open that door, the sound will attract it. If it’s a recon unit, it’s gonna find us and kill us. We have no choice—and I don’t think escaping is an option.  _ Not _ if we want to find Pidge.” Keith pinged everyone’s systems.

Everyone nodded—systems were a go.

“Okay. Lance and Hunk? You’re our only shot out of here if me and Matt fail,” Keith said. “Allura?”

“Yes, Keith?”

Keith pointed at the narrow stairs. “Can you attract its attention? Even one second counts,” he said.

Allura nodded and moved. Keith showed everyone their positions. The room had a few more door entrances, no doors, they could hide behind.

Keith and Matt positioned right before the main entrance, while Lance and Hunk hid behind one on each side of the room. They could do this. Allura extracted a knife—black blade and minimal design. Keith had no idea where she’d gotten it from. Her whole body had no pockets.

“Radio silence in five, four, three, two.”

_ One. _

Once the comms turned off, the place was only disturbed by the hissing Safeguard just a floor above them. Keith heard it land down the first flight of stairs. As soon as he could see its shadow, he went back to his post and signalled the others.

Lance and Hunk hid while Keith and Matt leaned hard against the wall—nail-shooters ready to fire.

Keith’s skin crawled as soon as he heard the Safeguard’s steady steps. It was unsettling, it brought back only bad memories. The worst of their kind. Keith blinked and focused on the task at hand, but his mind drifted for a second—to the moment he first heard those steps.

The Safeguard didn’t walk. They came rushing, ten of them for every individual the Lookouts scouted.

It was gut-twisting and nerve-wrecking, the way he’d run for his life like he’d never done before. And then they-

A high-pitched hiss bruised his eardrums. That was it, the doll had spotted Allura. The rhythm of its steps increased, but it still felt off—the missing limb was both reassuring and  _ wrong. _ Whenever the Safeguard weren’t at their best, Keith knew there would’ve been trouble.

It was a matter of seconds. He counted, and when the white mask crossed the door at full-speed, he shot.

The nails hit the target, but it was too low on the mask—they’d missed the main connections.

The doll screeched and turned towards Keith, red eyes blinking with cold, deadly logic.

“Keith!” was all he heard. Dreadful and desperate.

He ducked, but the claw came crushing against his helmet, tearing through it and hitting way too close. A sting of pain rushed into him, but he didn’t have time. He crouched and then leapt away from the doll, right before its hand crushed the concrete.

Then, two more nails bloomed from behind the mask.

The red eyes blinked a few times, and then they turned off—glassy dead grey right in the middle. The doll stopped moving, its whole body shifting to regain a balance only dictated by gravity.

Keith was cornered, and he realised only now. He would’ve been dead in the next second, hadn’t Hunk and Lance shot it through the head.

“Keith, are you alright?” Matt asked, reaching out for him and helping him on his feet.

Keith nodded, focused on breathing rather than speaking. His right cheek and mandible hurt, throbbing pain. He could feel liquid dripping down his neck. The helmet was still functioning, but now he had a huge gash on its right side. The aseptic smell got inside his nose—it was the first time he smelled the City outside of the village. And it smelled of nothing.

Keith shoved his nail out of the Safeguard’s body and holstered his nail-shooter on his back.

“I’m good,” he panted, still high on adrenaline, “let’s move.”

Everyone, aside from Allura, looked like they wanted to argue against that. Yet eventually they all did the same and followed his lead. Keith only hoped there wouldn’t be more Safeguard where that one came from—that he wasn’t guiding everyone to their end. Again.

* * *

After one vargas, Matt told them they were officially lost. They’d come back to where they found Pidge’s last sign. The only way forward was either keep going along the crevasse or try crossing one of the bridges—the few that weren’t broken off.

Keith wasn’t sure what to make of it. He couldn’t split the team, and yet it was only a natural decision if they wished to keep going.

“I’m coming with you,” Matt had said. “Allura stays with Hunk and Lance.”

Keith shook his head. “Absolutely not, we stick together.”

The discussion continued for a few doboshes, and it was clear how everyone felt about it—even Allura had pointed out the specifics, how much more possibilities they would’ve had if they did split up when they were so near.

Keith stared, anger bubbling up inside of him. He hated it, whenever the City forced them to play by its rules and break their own.

It was a small victory, another step towards death.

“We proceed together, even if we’re on different sides, got it?” Keith hissed—his jaw worked, sending spikes of pain every time the skin had to move, but he  _ had _ to give instructions. “You wait for us to be on the other side and keep comms open. Whoever finds a sign first, we come back here and follow the signs  _ together.” _

It was their best choice. Splitting up, but never move too far away from each other.

Everyone agreed to it, so he and Matt got a move on. The bridge wasn’t that hard to cross—Keith was steady on his feet. The whole left side of his face was dull pain, it spread through the insides just like the blood did on the outside.

He couldn’t talk for long periods of time. Not that he needed to.

The bridge creaked and squealed underneath them, but it held. Matt lost his balance a few times, cursed his way through, and then jumped to the ledge’s stability. Keith helped him out before checking in with the others.

“Everyone, sound off,” he said.

Everyone followed up with their name and “here” soon after—Allura too. Once they all did a round, Keith instructed they resume the original plan.

This side of the crevasse was polished and built by different sized metal panel. It was just slightly darker than the usual. Dim lights lit the way forward—Keith kept his eyes on the wall for scratches, but there was nothing to be seen—nothing to be scratched, really.

Matt cursed under his breath. “Lance, Hunk, any luck yet?” he asked.

When Lance opened comms, there was a slight interference that ruined his voice. “Not yet,” he said.

Keith grimaced. “Shit. We’re getting nowhere.”

Matt stopped walking, and so did Keith. “What if he’s dead, Keith? You’ve seen the Safeguard before, it was clearly coming out of a fight. Not a lot of things to fight out here,” he whispered. “What if they made a last stand and were killed? What if-”

“Hey, Matt,” Keith interrupted, grabbing Matt by his helmet. “Listen to me, alright? He’s alive and we’re gonna find him.”

Yet, it felt more like a lie Keith was telling himself rather than the truth. He knew better than to hope against the City. The City was relentless and cruel, it wouldn’t stop being that way just because they wanted it to.

Matt sighed and closed his eyes, like he’d just read Keith’s mind, and yet he nodded and exhaled hard.

They were about to turn when a familiar voice called from behind.

“Matt?”

Keith’s whole body tensed and then relaxed, just like Matt’s did—a spasm and he was almost shoving Keith out of the way. Pidge stood on in the opposite direction, the  _ thing _ right behind him. Their suits were intact. Not a scratch.

Keith was dumbfounded by the sight, could only tap into the comms and inform the others. “Guys, we found them.”

“What? Seriously?” Lance’s high pitched voice was the first to ring in his ears.

Then Hunk, and eventually Allura too. One of his cameras opened a small video-feed overlapping his, framing how the small group had stopped and was now turning back to where they parted ways.

Keith hurried.

Matt was already hugging and holding Pidge tight in his arms, exhaling all the worries he’d been through and how much scared he was he’d lost his brother. The  _ thing _ —Shiro, Keith had to forcefully remind himself—was just staring at them. A black, thin cable ran from the back of its neck to something—something Keith had never seen. There was something around its neck, black and minimalistic, with a blue dim light flashing in regular intervals.

“You’re late.” Keith spat, he couldn’t help the anger—they promised to be back in eight vargas. They had been out for almost ten.

“We ran into some trouble,” Pidge spoke on Shiro’s behalf. “He’s the coolest, by the way, saved my ass three times.”

Shiro didn’t reply, its eyes were lost somewhere—definitely not on them.

“What’s its deal?” Keith asked eventually.

Pidge turned to check on Shiro and let out a dismissive, “Oh, nothing.” He turned again and hugged Keith. “He’s transferring a backup of all his files, guess all those terabytes are heavy on his CPU.”

Keith grimaced, and then grimaced even more when Pidge pointed at his helmet.

“What the quiznack happened to you?” he asked.

Keith groaned. “A recon Safeguard. Had to take it down,” he cut short. “It was already damaged… was- was that you guys?” he asked, but he was only looking at Shiro.

“Shiro, he’s got  _ a lot _ of cool stuff I can’t wait to duplicate,” he said.

“Err, not to be a pain in the ass, but we’re here!” Lance groaned from the other side of the crevasse. The interference had worsened, but Keith could still make out the words.

“Can it move?” Keith asked instead, ignoring Lance’s complaints.

As if it was being called, Shiro blinked back to focus and looked at Keith. “Transfer complete, here are your files Pidge,” he announced as he offered the  _ thing _ to Pidge.

Pidge bounced and grabbed it, whatever it was. “Yay!” he chimed. “Let’s go, we got a deal to work through.”

Keith wanted to argue, but there wouldn’t have been time.

Pidge went ahead, followed by Matt and then Keith. Only Shiro stayed behind, scouting the area like he was checking for something. Keith couldn’t see, or feel anything. It was quiet, just like the City had been since they reached the narrow ledge.

“So I guess you don’t want to kill us all, huh?” he shot at Shiro while he took a step on the bridge.

The steps where mostly intact, but the structure creaked anyway under the pressure of their bodies. And then it gave in—so suddenly Keith had a very narrow wind to jump back and find he had nothing to jump to.

They were almost in the middle of the bridge, and he wouldn’t have made it. in front of him, Matt and Pidge had sprinted forward the same way he had—structure caving in underneath their feet.

Something grabbed Keith by the scruff of his suit and hauled him up, and then against the wall. His vision blacked out for a brief second, pain shooting through him until he’d seen lights flashing behind his eyelids. Something was holding him right before the abyss.

Keith experimented for a split second the fearful temptation to let himself fall down, see how deep he could reach, what was laying beneath all of this hard metal.

Then, Shiro dragged him up and on the ledge.

Keith gasped for air, lungs burning for the lack of oxygen, and head dizzy with dread and fear. He looked on the other side of the crevasse and found Pidge safe, while Matt was climbing the steps—a few grapples already tied around his waist directly twisted around Allura’s forearms. She was hauling him to safety too.

Keith let out a sigh of relief.

“Are you alright?”

Shiro occupied the rest of his vision, now crouched and offering a hand to help Keith up. Dark grey eyes stared, but there was no hatred, only the same cold calculation Allura had—only that there was something more.

Shiro had saved him, and now his brow was ever so slightly furrowed, a tiny hint of concern.

Keith nodded and accepted the help, held onto Shiro’s solid presence for a second too long when his head spun, and his knees were suddenly weak.

“Your helmet is damaged,” Shiro noted.

Keith groaned. “It was before, didn’t you notice?”

Shiro shook his head. “You are still wounded,” he assessed. “And bleeding.”

Keith couldn’t touch his face, not like this. He knew better than to do so with his suit on. “It’ll pass. It’s not deep.”

Shiro raised an eyebrow. “How would you know?”

“Keith! Are you okay?” Hunk panted in Keith’s comms. They were all back to safety, only they had one less way to cross the crevasse now. There was still another bridge they could use.

Keith couldn’t reply. A high-pitched hiss drew all of their attention away.

On Keith’s side, a few dozen of dolls were pouring outside of one of the tunnels. Eyes red pointed right on Keith and Shiro. Keith’s blood froze in his veins. That was it. They were as good as dead.

“RUN!” Lance shouted, still too far away to be heard.

The only thing Keith could think was running, yes, but not away from the Safeguard. He rushed to the last bridge standing, hand frantically rummaging for the explosives. They always had some, yet to move rubble, not to defend against the Safeguard.

All he could think of, though, was to cut the only way the Safeguard could’ve reached for the others.

“Keith? What are you doing?!” and a variation of questions buzzed in his comms, the interference growing. He turned off his comms before the Safeguard could pick up on their signal and placed the explosives.

Shiro was still standing where Keith had left him. He now had a gun in his hand, pointed at the Safeguard.

_ He’s gonna get himself killed. _ The thought crossed Keith’s mind—a small distraction, and then he set off the explosives.

The bridge crumbled, dust and smoke rising and hiding the group right like Keith wanted. They were safe—he’d saved them.

He let himself fall on his knees, body dizzy and breaths heavy.

Shiro was still there, gun lit up with one, small light. It was a second, and then the sound got eaten up by  _ something. _ Keith didn’t know what it was, but it devoured everything that stood in its way in a whole six feet radius—maybe more.

When it was done, the edges were smeared white-hot, cooling down to a bright red, and Shiro stood right in the middle of it, the explosion taking all Keith’s visual who knew how many miles away. It was enormous.

Keith barely registered Shiro hauling him up on his feet and helping him walk. He’d caught a glimpse of more Safeguard though. They were still coming.

“Now we run,” Shiro informed.

Keith registered it like a distant sound, and yet his body moved, and he let Shiro guide him in the new maze the City had in store for them. Maybe Shiro really knew how to keep them safe. Right now, though, they needed a safe place to hide in until the Safeguard were called back in.

Maybe Keith could really survive this, after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OOF, finally we can have these two all for ourselves lkasdjaklsdjaskdj
> 
> I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter <3 more to come in the future!! I'll try to keep publish every week, or at least every two weeks. I'd love to finish this like a proper thing.
> 
> As always, I have a [Tumblr]()!! You're more than welcomed to come freak out in my inbox / DMs <3


	5. Look alive, sunshine!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> aNOTHER ONE!
> 
> Boy am I writing a lot these days. It's mostly my apology for disappearing for three months completely (and proof that I'm so getting into the story I can't wait for you guys to find out the plot twists welp)
> 
> This chapter's editing has been done by [paladin-pile](https://paladin-pile.tumblr.com), thank you so much!! I hope you guys enjoy <3
> 
> Also, change in rating because there's graphic description of an open wound. So watch out for **blood and gore**!!
> 
> Hope you enjoy <3

Keith’s lungs were burning, his whole body was too, now that he thought about it. His legs ached deep down in the bones from the strain, he couldn’t feel his feet anymore—they’d been swallowed by pins and needles, like they were all trying to get a bits of Keith’s skin.

They’d been running for too long, and Keith wasn’t sure he knew the way back anymore—yet Shiro kept going, kept pushing through, like his body wasn’t his to consume.

_ Its, _ Keith distantly thought, and yet he couldn’t bring himself to think about Shiro as a  _ thing _ , let alone as a  _ thing _ that secretly wanted to kill them. He’d saved Pidge, and now Keith’s life too.

Shiro took a sharp turn deeper into the maze, and Keith followed.

His legs gave out and he stumbled forward, suit dragging him down and incapacitating his movements. He hit the ground hard with his knees, but before his face joined too, strong hands caught him by the shoulders and hauled him back up.

“We have to run,” Shiro said, voice unmoving.

Keith gasped for breath. His whole throat was sore, mouth dry. His right side was still throbbing in pain, he was so sure the plates were scratching at the skin, keeping the gash open and bleeding. Keith was hurting,  _ bad, _ but he knew the other option wasn’t negotiable.

Either he hurt now, or he didn’t at all. Anymore.

He tried to walk, but his legs were too weak. His whole body was heavy, dragging him down. “I can’t-”

“I understand.”

Keith stared with a confused look, only to find Shiro crouching and hurling Keith on his shoulder. Keith found some focus at that, but he was too tired to do anything but being dead-weight on Shiro’s shoulders. Yet, Shiro looked unaffected by it.

They ran, and Keith cursed at the way Shiro’s armour pressed against the wrong plates of his own suit, digging them in uncomfortable places—his ribcage, for instance. The movement made it hard for Keith to breathe. He was too stiff, too squished to do anything but struggle for the few breaths he could draw in.

Keith had lost track of time—he was sure he’d blacked out a few times, and his vision was still a blur whenever he opened his eyes. His front plate display was buzzing, so he turned it off. It was useless, now that they were this far away from home.

By the time Shiro stopped, Keith was awfully aware the scar on his face, and how bad it hurt.

Shiro kicked open a heavy door and entered what looked like a giant skyscraper. Why they were called that, Keith didn’t know—he didn’t know what a sky was and why something would scrape it. As soon as they got in, Shiro helped Keith down on the ground and went back to closing the door.

It still wasn’t enough.

They had to reach deeper into the building, so no Safeguard could’ve poked their head through the empty windows and scout the insides of the room. They usually didn’t, but this was clearly a hunting party, and neither Shiro—nor Keith, really—looked like they wanted to be found by the Safeguard.

Keith grunted, sitting in the corner of another dusty room. It was dark in there, and he didn’t have much to light it with. Matt and Hunk had brought their camping gear, Keith only had his mat to spread and sleep on.

Shiro was still checking the perimeter. Keith watched him disappear out of the door and heard him moving stuff around, probably to block anything from peeking in. Soon, Keith would’ve been in the dark, and he needed the rest—but more importantly…

“Shit,” he hissed as he removed his helmet. The plates were curved on the inside, which meant they scratched and would rip through his skin if he didn’t pay attention. He couldn’t open his frontal plate for the same reason, so he simply dragged it slowly and uncomfortably out of his head. His cheek and jawbone didn’t thank him.

Fresh blood poured on Keith’s skin, and now he was sure of it. His whole neck was a mess, but he still needed to hurry up. He removed his gloves and the chest plate, until he could properly breathe.

It was hard to treat a wound without a mirror, but he needed to make do. He got out his flashlight and scouted the place. It was hard to find any reflective surface, but he was fairly sure he didn’t need to remove anything from his wounds. The plates were built specifically so when they tore, they wouldn’t lose blisters.

Nothing. He would’ve needed to use the cameras on his helmet—which were curved. Keith held the flashlight with one hand, his features distorted on the bigger camera his helmet had—which wasn’t a lot. The gash went from his lower jaw bone, right under his cheekbone—it was worse than Keith had thought. Bits of skin hung off of the lower length, dead tissue he had to remove.

His gut twisted, and Keith fought back the urge to throw up when he grabbed onto one of the slices and pulled. It would only get in the way, and he only needed the fresh tissue to scab, not everything else. He used some of his water resources too and washed the gash clean.

He could handle the pain, and yet his teeth hurt by how much he was clenching his jaw.

The process was long; working with just one hand wasn’t exactly his forte—and he’d be damned if he asked for Shiro’s help, let alone wait for him. Shiro was already doing more than Keith would’ve ever asked of him.

Keith kept repeating to himself it was because Shiro had still something to gain from this—it wasn’t out of compassion or anything. Shiro wanted something from them, and he was damn sure to get it. Keith ignored the pang of disappointment that shot right through his chest.

His belt pocket came in handy—he was glad he’d brought ointments and bandages, just in case Pidge would’ve needed them. Slowly, Keith was able to apply some of the medical balm Allura invented throughout the deca-phoebes.

It hurt, and it also gave Keith some relief soon after. The bandages where next, together with the molecular tape. Keith had never been more thankful for bringing this much stuff with him—he usually liked to travel light.

Once the wound was taken care of, Keith unrolled the thin mattress. It was black and compacted, dirty with all the other times Keith had used it. He’d cleaned it multiple times, but it still smelled of dust and cement and Keith’s sweat. It was familiar.

Keith sat down on it and waited a few doboshes for Shiro to come back. They needed to talk, decide what would their next move be.

Shiro didn’t come back, but Keith could definitely hear him treading somewhere in the distance. Keith felt strangely safe—safe enough to curl on his side, face the wall, and close his eyes. His cheek was still throbbing, but the pain was duller now than before. It kept him from sleeping in the first doboshes, and yet there he was, slipping under the heavy darkness his eyelids brought.

* * *

 

When Shiro came back, Keith was bundled up on a black mat, body curled and back exposed.

_ Foolish, _ Shiro thought. Giving his back to the room, especially in a situation like this,  would certainly mean Keith was as good as dead. Yet, a part of Shiro couldn’t help but believe it was because of Shiro himself, that Keith felt safe enough to let down his guard.

He’d been scouting the area for the past forty-five minutes, only to come back once he was sure no Safeguard was following them.

System had computed the probability of the hunting party being called back—they were low. Lower than usual.

Now that Shiro had alerted them, it would be hard to shake them. They would keep coming and swarm the lower level and sector to be sure he was gone. It was clear, and would stay that way for at least a day they were lucky.

System reminded him there was no such thing as luck. Shiro agreed.

He sat down, eyes fixed on the human boy who was now sleeping. He checked in on his vitals but couldn’t do more without having to walk close and get a proper look across Keith’s shoulder. From here, all Shiro could see were dark messy locks of hair—a lot of it.

Keith’s body was solid, but slimmer than Shiro’s. Yet, he was bigger and more muscular than Pidge. It was hard to tell from their suits alone, but the difference was stressed enough Shiro could tell it. The “Matt” Pidge had hugged? Shiro would’ve sworn it was Keith, if only Pidge hadn’t called him that way and Shiro hadn’t tapped into his comms and video-feed too.

System established Matt and Pidge shared DNA—which was to say, they were siblings.

Keith was soundly sleeping, so that left Shiro with a lot of things to occupy the hours with. He rebooted sub-processors and compressed everything he’d been able to collect on the humans. Then, he ran another diagnostic, making sure System was a go, and his body would be ready if they needed to escape.

The GBE had quickly consumed his energy levels, which were now recharging. System recommended him to use one of the syringes, yet Shiro still had time to recharge some of the energy on his own. He could still go about for another few days before he’d needed a full-recharge, that was if he didn’t use the GBE.

Would that have been the case? Could they escape without Shiro blowing holes in the whole sector?

Shiro grimaced and reached for the syringe. It was black, just like everything that blended inside his armour. It only had a small rectangle glowing blue on its side. It was full, just like System had registered. Good, he hadn’t damaged it in the process of escaping the safeguard—especially after jumping down the crevasse with Pidge on him.

_ Especially _ after he’d jumped and used his own body as shield to prevent Pidge from hurting himself.

Shiro uncapped the syringe and injected it in his neck, a soft sound hissed and broke the silence—the pressure cap releasing the needle and all its content inside Shiro.

System immediately registered energy spikes, his whole systems powering up in a bright blue, before he could balance everything back to its standard levels and to his low-power mode.

He let the syringe fall on the ground and stared as Keith stirred on his mat.

Right, humans were jumpy. Shiro didn’t want Keith to wake up in a sprint of adrenaline and kiss goodbye his only hours of rest. He needed it. They both would needed it.

So Shiro closed his eyes and leaned his back against the other corner of the room, audio processors set to intercept anything rhythmic which could resemble a Safeguard pace. System powered down and he slept, arms and legs crossed, GBE ready in its holster.

* * *

When Shiro came to, Keith was already wearing his helmet. System came back online in a matter of seconds, initialising everything that had been put either in sleep mode or as a background activity. His energy levels were back to normal, and he felt refreshed.

System had already alerted him of the ugly cut on Keith’s helmet, how it could’ve only been inflicted by the Safeguard—he couldn’t assess the damage because of the helmet, and now Keith refused to show his face once more.

“You can remove your helmet, we still have time,” Shiro let Keith know, even though it didn’t stop Keith from wrapping his mat up and clasping it just above his belt. The suit provided a place for those kind of things too, then.

System added the information. Humans were equipped to camp outside their villages. It was a good thing, as it increased, however slightly, Shiro’s probabilities to meet more of them during his journey.

“We still have to be ready,” Keith grunted, sitting back down in his corner. “Just in case they do find us before it’s time.”

Shiro agreed. “Yet, you should let your wound rest. I could fix your helmet, if you wish.”

He tried to tap into Keith’s comms, but they were turned off, and his video-feed was severely damaged. Shiro felt his lips tightening in a slight grimace.

“Just say you want to run the damn analysis,” Keith snarled.

Shiro frowned. “Why would I not want anymore?” he asked.

Keith didn’t answer for a long period of time—so long Shiro thought Keith didn’t hear him. “What? What does that mean?”

Shiro looked around, confused. “You already know I need to analyse you, why should I hide such information at this point?”

“Yeah, and I don’t want you to do that,” Keith hissed.

“Why?”

A groan escaped Keith’s helmet. It was muffled without the suit’s speakers, but Shiro could hear him just fine. “I just don’t want you to, damn it.”

Shiro frowned deeper this time. “I do not understand. I will not harm you, nor force you to do so, yet you still sound… defensive,” was that the correct term? “is there something else you wish me to prove?”

“Ugh.”

Shiro blinked.  _ Ugh _ was not registered in his vocabulary—yet it did feel strangely accurate for the mood Keith was in. “Is it because you do not trust me?”

Keith crossed his arms, leg twitching regularly.  _ Pissed-off, _ System obviated. Keith was pissed-off. About what, Shiro was yet unsure.

“Is it because you are away from your own kind?” Shiro tried again, maybe eventually he would’ve guessed.

Keith groaned, louder this time. “Quiznack, will you stop it? I’m not talking to you.”

Shiro hesitated and lowered his gaze. Did he do something? Was this some kind of human test to see if he’d lose patience? He would’ve passed it, as Shiro didn’t really have a patience to exhaust. He could wait as long as Keith wanted.

Shiro closed his eyes once more. If Keith didn’t want to speak, he would’ve just resumed his sleep cycle. The more he could get, the better.

Eventually, it was Keith who gave in to the silence and spoke again. Shiro was running the umpteenth diagnostic to make sure every system was a go when he heard the frustrated huff.

He opened one eye.

Keith was now standing up and stalking towards him, posture straight and determined, like he wanted to intimidate Shiro.

It didn’t work.

“What’s this stuff you’re looking for? And what will you do with it once you find it?” Keith’s voice was a demand, not really a question.

“I am looking for Net Terminal Genes. They allow a full-access to the Netsphere—whoever has that kind of clearance can reprogram the Safeguard here,” Shiro explained. “If I can find someone with such genes, I might be able to connect to the Netsphere and disable the protocol against biological life.”

“Why?”

Shiro shook his head. “I do not know. I just know it is what I am supposed to do.”

Keith snorted, defiant of whatever Shiro had just told him. “And you’re just gonna do it. Like it’s your business in the first place? Aren’t you a  _ thing? _ Why would a  _ thing _ help fleshbags out?”

Shiro didn’t answer. “Computing,” he read out loud.

After five minutes, he still couldn’t find an answer.

He stopped the process and went back to Keith. “I do not know.”

Keith didn’t move, not much at least. He paced and then groaned again, before sitting down right in front of Shiro. He pointed his finger at Shiro and pressed it against Shiro’s pectoral. “If you fuck us over, I’ll personally kill you—I don’t care about that fancy gun of yours, I  _ will _ end you.”

Shiro blinked, confusion still there. “I understand,” he said. He wasn’t scared—why should he be? He didn’t intend to harm any humans anyway. Keith didn’t need to worry in the first place.

Keith nodded once, hesitating all the way through it. “Okay.” And then he put his hands around his helmet. It was painfully slow, the way Keith extracted his head from the helmet, like he was about to get his eyeball cut off if he didn’t pay attention.

Shiro doubted it’d be far away from the truth. The metal sheets could cut flesh like a sharpened knife. What drew Shiro’s attention, though, was the face he could finally associate with Keith’s voice. Fair-skinned with dark, deep blue eyes and jet-black messy locks, the same Shiro had seen a few hours before.

It was harmonious in a way Shiro had only seen in faraway sectors of the City—something that broke the crooked and wicked lines of the whole place. It was rare, and yet here it was.

Shiro tilted his head.

Keith’s brows were knitted together right from the start, hostility cruelly obvious. “What?”

Shiro was shocked back to focus by his voice. “You are beautiful.”

Keith’s face grew red in what must’ve been a record time, eyes widening with outrage and confusion. “The- the fuck is that supposed to mean?!” he snapped, jaw dropping only to go back, pain shooting through Keith’s features.

Shiro’s eyes went to the cut. “Do you have something better than,” he waited for System to analyse what  _ that _ was, “molecular tape?” he asked, frowning.

Keith grunted and shook his head. “Just fix the damn helmet and get this analysis done already,” he complained, pushing his helmet against Shiro’s abdomen.

Shiro took the helmet and explored the damage. The cut had curved almost all the plates inwards, luckily for Keith it was only the most faraway parts. System analysed the damage, and some parts would be missing. The helmet would’ve never covered all of Keith’s face, but it could still be of use.

“You were lucky,” Shiro stated, turning the helmet once more and studying the exterior of the cut. “A few centimetres deeper and your jawbone would’ve been sawed.”

“Yeah, thanks, that’s really helpful.”

Shiro didn’t have a name for Keith’s tone, so he settled for a, “You are welcome.”

He didn’t reply, so Shiro raised his eyes to check on him, only to find him staring at Shiro like Shiro had just said something stupid. Did he?

“You’re not strong on sarcasm, are you?”

_ Computing. _

“Oh, I see,” Shiro resumed with a small smile, “you were making fun of me, were you not?”

Keith stared  _ again. _ Shiro didn’t know what he’d done now. He studied as Keith’s eyes widened in surprise and something else he couldn’t quite place, it was like betrayal, but Keith wasn’t offended, nor did Shiro actually betray him.

There was nothing to betray in the first place.

“What’s wrong with you?”

Shiro raised his head. He had never posed the question to himself. Was there anything wrong? “I suppose there would be a great deal, comparing my behaviour to yours. I am different.”

Keith’s furrow deepened—he looked young, and yet he behaved like an adult. Shiro was curious to know what other reactions were there, just like he’d done with Pidge. It was amusing, how the human face would twist and relax accordingly to the individual’s mood.

Shiro resumed his work.

He forcefully shifted the metal plates towards the exterior of the helmet, and then took out his belt-knife. It had a black blade, and it was useful in close-combat—he’d cut down a lot of crooked dolls that way. It was easier, sometimes, than to use the GBE for just two or three of them.

He was about to cut the extra plates from the helmet when Keith grabbed at his wrist and blocked him. System reported an increasing pressure in the same place—Shiro didn’t feel much, other than tactic sensations.

Keith’s grip was strong.

“Where did you get that?” Keith asked. “Allura has the same one.”

Shiro stared at the knife. System was at a loss. “I do not know,” he declared.

Keith shoved him away. “Is there  _ anything _ you know?”

Shiro nodded. Of course he had some shred of knowledge. He  _ knew  _ a lot more than Keith, yet Keith made it sound like Shiro was the ignorant one. It threw him off in a way Shiro didn’t fully understand. “I do know other things, yet you still have to ask about them. Would you like me to list them for you?”

“You really take things too literally,” Keith answered.

Shiro didn’t know what to do with that answer, other than Keith wasn’t exactly asking what Shiro knew. “I believe I do not know what you are asking of me.”

“Nothing, you’re being as useful as you can.”

Ah, that was it then. Usefulness. Shiro was useful on a pure physical level, but not exactly as a conversation partner. “I understand,” he said, “thank you for explaining.” And went back to the helmet.

Keith stood still as Shiro peeled the excess of metal plates. They come off quietly, hitting his legs and then rolling down on the ground. Shiro is glad the knife was designed to cut through the Safeguard like water. Once everything was cut off, he smoothed the edges off with a bit of his own armour.

Shiro took his time to put everything like he wanted. The opening was large, but Keith didn’t need to worry that his eyes would show—anything would’ve just been able to see his skin up to the cheekbone. He would’ve been safe from infection, if they got too close to the Safeguard once more.

“Try it on,” Shiro said, offering the helmet to Keith.

Keith took it with hesitation and wariness—his whole body languages creamed suspicion and doubt, like Shiro could still turn on him and use him to get to their village. Then, eventually, Keith decided to go for it and wear the helmet. It slid easier than the way Keith had removed it, and Shiro was somewhat proud for that—it was clearly a better arrangement than before.

“Wow,” Keith exhaled, turning on the frontal plate and having it shift upwards, freeing his face and leaving it uncovered once more. “Thanks.”

“You are welcome,” Shiro replied—and he smiled, like that was part of his program.

The smile died down quickly. System prompted Keith’s facial recognition and requested him to initialise analysis. Shiro looked back to Keith, who was now removing the helmet once more and laying it down next to his legs.

Keith frowned. “What’s up?”

“I would like to scan you, is that okay?” Shiro asked—and yet, he couldn’t help but be confused by  _ Keith’s _ confusion.

“Wait, you still have to do it? I thought you’d already- didn’t you get the scan as soon as I removed my helmet?”

Shiro shook his head.

“Why?”

Shiro was at a loss. He shrugged. “You did not give explicit consent—although I will wait for you to agree to it, I do not wish to impose.” System flashed red—potential conflict of major instructions. The two necessities  _ could _ work along together, although if Shiro’s need for explicit consent got in the way, Shiro didn’t know what would happen.

He ignored the tingling sensation his whole body gave him in a split second, before it all stopped.

“So if I told you no-”

Shiro’s expression twitched. System was still flashing red— _ beware, _ potential conflict of major instructions. “I would be forced to wait until you could be reasoned with and see that I’m trying to help.”

Where did the consent one even come from? Had Shiro put it there? Was it  _ his? _ He didn’t know. He closed his eyes, vision glitching. He would  _ not _ go against both orders, nor one of them. It was his mission, he would’ve accomplished how he’d see fit.

The flashing red drilled and dug deeper into his core. It was something Shiro had never felt before—it  _ felt _ wrong. Like he was going against bigger than him, like the whole City itself. That couldn’t be it. Shiro was merely a haphazardly pile of biocomponents and wires and biological parts.

“You okay?”

Shiro snapped back to focus. “Yes,” he lied.

Keith sighed and shifted uncomfortably on the spot. “Okay, well, I don’t even know why I’m making such a big fuss out of this—considering you’re saving me and also keeping Pidge safe?”

Keith’s features softened, his deep blue eyes never made contact with Shiro’s, but they did change as did Keith’s voice—the tone had changed too, his husky voice was lower, smoother in a way. It felt like Keith was grateful, Shiro concluded.

“So you can get the scan, alright?”

Shiro nodded. “Thank you, Keith.”

That earned him a smile—it was small and private, something that vanished as soon as it crossed Keith’s lips, and left Shiro wanting for a bit more. Curiosity lingered right on Shiro’s tongue, but he kept it there and accepted System’s prompt.

> Initialise analysis?
> 
> >Yes

Shiro’s HUD popped up in the top right corner of his peripheral. It was light blue and displayed the analysis percentage. He focused on Keith’s face, pointers rushing through his features to get a deep scan, his eyes were first, then his lips, scar, and so on.

In a few seconds, the HUD percentage filled up completely to a 100% and Shiro almost winced when green popped for a brief second in the report analysis. He waited—it had already happened that the analysis showed false results, the program had to cross-reference a lot of things to get a complete answer.

His vision glitched almost immediately, and Shiro blinked.

When he watched again, the same line of code was red, displaying a negative result.

He closed the HUD and let System archive the report in his storage.

“Negative,” he stated, and Keith almost drew a breath in.

“See? Told you it’d be pointless,” Keith sighed, his posture relaxing. “Besides, what will you anyway do if you find someone with this gene?”

Shiro allowed himself to think about it, he lowered his gaze. He stared at their legs crossed together, how Shiro’s were collected and tidy, while Keith’s posture skewed from Shiro’s guidelines. Keith would hurt his back if he kept at it, in a few years, he’d lament backpain. It was a human thing to do, brief comfort rather than durability.

Shiro somewhat admired it, the ability to choose priorities based on the moment, rather than in function to some outcome.

“I would need to reach the Megastructure to find an access point,” he supposed. He didn’t exactly  _ know _ what to do, he’d found out how his program built instructions with time and according to what Shiro needed. It was self-autonomous, something that reminded Shiro of a conscience, a very logical one. “I would need to find a human with Net Terminal Genes to know precisely what to do, I suppose.”

Keith raised an eyebrow, but didn’t say  much apart from a low, “Uh, okay.” He tapped his index finger on his knee. “So, what’s the plan now? Do we just wait here and then move? I have no idea how to go back to the village from here,” he added after a bit.

Shiro nodded. “We need to keep low until the Safeguard gives up chasing us,” he explains, “it will be hard, but not impossible. We might need to reach lower levels, so they can’t spread any further and cover the ground—the City is too big to chase after two small targets.”

Shiro elaborated a few routes he had considered since he’s arrived in the sector. He would’ve explored the maze, the one in which he’d encountered Pidge and the others, and then he would’ve come back to the buildings they were hiding in right now. They could still reach the lower levels or go deeper down this one—he’d got sight of a few tunnels not far from where they were staying.

“We have a few options,” he said as he  quietly laid out his plan, checking on Keith whether his frown meant disagreement or just that he was puzzled about the whole situation. Sometimes, Keith frowned and nodded—like the two things could ever work together. Shiro had to ask for clarification to understand what Keith meant (“Are you agreeing or disagreeing with me?”), other times Keith would fill the blanks before Shiro asked.

Eventually, Keith agreed to Shiro’s plan with a few modifications—implementation, actually, small things Shiro hadn’t considered and was surprised Keith would think of. The human’s mind was most cunning, as sharp as his tongue when he’d snarled at Shiro when they first met.

They slipped in a comfortable conversation right after that. Keith had snorted after a long pause, and Shiro had inquired on the reason behind it.

“Just remembered the first time me and the others got stuck away from the village,” Keith explained, “Lance was freaking out—and honestly, right now I do understand him a little bit.”

Keith’s expression was softer when he talked about the other humans—they were best friends, “Almost family,” Keith had corrected.

Shiro blinked. “Almost? Family?”

Keith shot him a curious look. “You don’t know what that is?”

Shiro instantly searched in his vocabulary array. “A group consisting of two parents and their children living together as a unit,” he read out loud. “I believe I am confused as to who is the parent and who the children.”

Keith laughed. “That’s like, very specific? We’re all the same age, give it or take, we grew up together. There’s nothing we do alone outside the village,” he explains. “The almost part is, well, we don’t share the same blood—but it’s not that big of a deal.”

Shiro nodded. “Why should it be?”

“Eh?”

“You said it is not a big deal, as if in other cases it would be. Why is this different?”

This time it was Keith who blinked in confusion. “Oh, no, I guess it’s just a way of saying?”

Shiro nodded, but he registered the way Keith’s change in expression. Curiosity encouraged him to break the silence, so he forced himself to think of something else. “How old are you?”

Keith frowned, caught off-guard by the question. “Uhm, I’m twenty-four deca-phoebes,” he said after a bit. “Why?”

Shiro shrugged—it was unusual, and yet it felt like fitting the situation. “I would like to get to know you and your friends,” he explained. “You have peculiar ways of relating to me, and so far, you trusted me regardless of my intentions.”

Keith pouted and mumbled something Shiro couldn’t quite catch. He frowned, but didn’t insist so Keith would repeat himself. “You’re- you’re weird, man,” Keith eventually stuttered.

“Am I?” Shiro asked. “I guess I do go against human social constructs. I do not require company to function.”

Shiro found Keith’s eyes darting at him, it wasn’t hostile, but it did make Shiro’s skin crawl with something between uneasiness and a tight knot—anticipation. What he was anticipating, Shiro didn’t exactly know.

Keith looked like he was about to say something, but then he gave up and huffed. “How old are you?” Keith asked instead.

Shiro computed. System returned with nothing. He frowned and checked his last log. “My logs have been corrupted, but I do have recordings dating back to four years ago,” he said. “I believe I have been activated much longer than that. Although I cannot remember.”

“Why’s that? Don’t you have, like, back-ups or something?”

Shiro shook his head. “They would require an external storage unit, which I do not possess right now—I do not remember what has corrupted them, maybe a virus. It would explain the factory reset System has gone through.”

Keith nodded, eyebrows twitching once more. “What if you’d found someone with genes? What then? you might’ve lost everything on them.”

Shiro had taken into consideration the idea. “I checked the whole sector I woke up in, but there were no signs of human activity,” he explained. “So I kept going in whichever direction System pointed at.”

Keith grimaced. “So, you’ve been alone for four years?”

Shiro smiled. “Correct.”

“And you haven’t gone mad? No one to talk to? Just walking around?”

Shiro shrugged again. “I do not require social interaction to function,” he repeated.

“Yeah, I get it, but don’t you want something? Like, apart from finding this genes, what will you do once you do find them? Sit down and wait for your component to fry out and die?”

Shiro hesitated. His program allowed him free thinking, yet he wasn’t sure what he would’ve done once his mission was completed. Could it be completed? He doubted it, and yet here he was, following a bigger scheme he was just a tiny part of.

“I don’t know,” he lets out. “I guess I’ll have to see once I’m there.”

Keith huffed. “That’s depressing.”

_ Depressing. _ Shiro checked his vocabulary array once more.  _ Making you feel unhappy and without hope for the future. _ Shiro frowned. “I don’t think I can feel depressed,” he says. “On the contrary, I should have been built to not feel emotions.”

Yet, he did feel disappointment a hours ago. So had he felt curiosity when he met the humans—even now that he was talking to Keith. System alerted him of another conflict in his program.

“Sure, and I’m-”

A loud noise had them jump on their feet. Keith’s wide eyes shot Shiro silent questions, before he hurried to put on the bits of armour he’d left on the ground. “Shit,” he hissed. “What now?!”

Shiro scanned the place. He detected nothing.

Another loud noise—closer this time. Shiro pulled out the GBE and readied his first shot. The Safeguard couldn’t have possibly found them, or could it? Shiro moved quickly to the back of the room. He’d left a way out, he always left an easy way out.

Keith soon followed, and Shiro made sure he didn’t lose track of him. “Go ahead,” he instructed when the same noise had them shake—Shiro clearly heard a wall crumble behind them.

Keith hurried and rushed forward, following the tight corridor and then jumping some of the stairs. Shiro was right after him, elbows stretched out, so he was sure he would cover Keith completely from possible projectiles.

Whatever was following didn’t hiss, didn’t make a sound. It wasn’t the Safeguard, and Shiro’s System flashed with a giant UNKNOWN ENEMY in his peripheral. It was no issue for Shiro, but he was worried for Keith’s—

His mind jerked at the idea.  _ Worry. _ Machines didn’t worry. Machines compiled and  _ nothing else. _ Shiro choked his own thoughts out. He needed to focus on the situation. He tapped into Keith’s comms,

“Go for the tunnels,” he muttered quietly, knowing Keith would hear him.

Keith only pinged him back, and then he was lunging out of the building—they were on the other side of the whole structure, dark brownish and porous concrete welcomed their steps with hollow echoes. Some of the buildings had crumbled down on their own, collapsing part of the ground too.

It looked like something an aquifer would cause, and yet there was no water—it had probably been drained through the cracks, down who knows what.

Keith was already rushing down the tunnels when a big explosion brought down the building they were in. The shockwave impacted against Shiro’s back and had him tremble, Keith stumbled and went flying down the tunnel with a scream.

Shiro lunged forward and grabbed him before it was too late, closing his arms around him and crouching. A few debris hit Shiro’s back in multiple places, System reporting minor damages to the armour structural integrity.

Shiro timed their movements, and as soon as the bigger debris came crushing, he pushed Keith ahead. “Run,” he instructed.

Keith didn’t need any encouragement, he was already darting down the tunnel, darkness eating any source of light away so much that Keith turned his flashlight on.

Shiro could only open his mouth to advise against it when something pierced through his left side with force, pushing him ahead and nailing him to the ground, falling on one of his knees. System flashed a breach in the armour, and a few biocomponents severely damaged, and another one which had lost connection to.

“Shiro!” Keith shouted, just a few meters ahead of him.

Shiro didn’t turn, he pointed his arm backwards and braced for impact. He pulled the trigger.

His arm twisted with the odd angle, System alerting him of multiple joint dislocations. Behind him, the burning heat and smell of-

Shiro’s smell detector reported silicon components.

_ That can’t be, _ he thought.

Keith was already helping him standing, but the black spear was still too high for Shiro to extract. They had to cut it. “Knife,” he instructed.

His right arm was out of joint, he’d need a few dozen minutes to fix it. Time they didn’t have.

Keith caught up quickly and extracted Shiro’s knife. Shiro fell lower on the spear so Keith could cut it as low as possible, and then he raised once more. System was buzzing, his vision glitched when the power almost cut short. His whole body twitched in a spasm when the power spike came back and was quickly on his feet again.

“Let’s go,” he said, his voice husky and low.

“Can you move?” Keith gasped.

Shiro didn’t reply, he just pushed Keith ahead and started running. The spear had hit non-essential components, but he was losing blood. They needed to find another safe place, quickly, and hopefully recover before Shiro’s power ran out.

Shiro shared System’s timer with Keith. They had only one hour before he’d entered sleep mode to recover the worst of the injuries.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OOF, how's cliffhangers for a change? You'll see lots of them because I can't fit everything in one chapter (whops)
> 
> I hope you guys liked it, and next chapter will have a different char POV (I have yet to decide, maybe, who knows). Thanks for reading, commenting and leaving kudos, y'all making me cry in my bed srsly.
> 
> As always, I've got a [Tumblr](http://emsawards.tumblr.com) you can come and freak out to, inbox and DMs are open <3


	6. Before last night's blood dries

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> IT'S HERE AAHHHHH
> 
> I'm so hyped for this chapter, FINALLY SOME TWISTS UNTANGLE (winky eyes)
> 
> I'll keep it short so you folks can go read the chapter (it's a bit long but hey!!!!) sorry if this is late, but I'm dealing with school, exams, and a short dissertation welp.
> 
> Also, thanks to [@myonlystorm](https://myonlystorm.tumblr.com) on Tumblr for betareading this!!!
> 
> I guess the story will need **mutual pining** and **slow burn** as new tags because these two have no clue what to do with their lives, let alone each other. Again, watch out for **blood and gore** in this chapter!!

Pidge was still running when Keith blew up the bridge. “KEITH, NO!” he screamed, but it was too late. A giant cloud of smoke, dust, and cement engulfed him, together with the rest of the group. The Safeguard hissed like crazy, and then Pidge heard it again. The liquid and short gurgle that Shiro’s gun emitted when shot.

Something grabbed Pidge right by the scruff of his armour, dragging him with force back and away. He fought against it, arms flailing and legs kicking. “Let me go!” he shouted.

“Shut up, they’re gonna hear us!” Matt hissed behind him, holding him tight and against the wall. They were inside something, Pidge didn’t know, but he supposed it was one of the many rooms all the sector’s walls had—given away by the multiple and ordered windows on them.

“We gotta go! They’ll never make it!” Pidge pleaded, tears biting the back of his eyes. He didn’t want to cry in the middle of this, but he’d seen too many of the Safeguard to believe Shiro’s gun could take them away with one shot. “We have to-”

“M-maybe Pidge’s right, maybe we should-” Hunk started, voice low, but he got cut off by Matt turning towards him and  _ staring. _

Pidge elbowed Matt right under his frontal plate. Matt coughed and shrunk away, but he didn’t let go. “Damn it, Pidge! We’re not abandoning them!” he hissed again. “But we need to play this smart, or we’re all going to die—you hear me?”

Pidge was shaken a few times, like he was some sort of water-bag or something. He closed his eyes, jaw working, and shoved the tears back. He needed to calm down and think this through, or Keith would never make it out alive. Besides, he was with  _ Shiro. _ The same guy that blew all the Safeguard into nothingness right above Pidge’s eyes. If anyone had any chance, it would’ve been them.

Matt was right. Getting out now would’ve only meant death. Shiro couldn’t babysit all of them, and Allura wasn’t equipped to do the same. On either of the crevasse’s sides, moreover.

Pidge breathed through.

“That’s it, deep breaths,” Matt hummed, hand stroking circles on Pidge’s back like their Ma used to do when they were little. “It’s gonna be okay.”

Pidge nodded. “Sorry... I- I’m okay now.”

Matt smiled in his small video-feed right in front of Pidge’s eyes, the others were still present, but in transparency, and minimized in a corner. “Don’t’ sweat it, Knuckles.”

They found shelter inside one of the empty rooms deeper inside the sector and set up a provisory camp. Lance and Hunk kept watch while Pidge, Matt, and Allura found a solution to their situation. Pidge pulled his stuff from the belt pockets; he always carried a notepad around, and now he was glad he did.

“Shiro said he’d already been in this sector, so maybe he had a map or something,” he said as he plugs the hardware with all of Shiro’s memory in it. It’s painfully slow, but eventually the pad loads all the terabytes of information.

Pidge quickly followed Allura instructions to the path of where each sector’s map would be stored; Allura was the only one with a computer-like arrangement, although her paths were slightly different from Shiro’s. Pidge’s heart almost fell to see all of them. There were  _ a ton _ . One folder alone counted over two thousand files worth of information. He was silently thankful that he could still order each one by date rather than name.

Though the first file was named differently than the rest, Pidge transferred it to Allura nonetheless. However, Allura shook her head, it wasn’t that one, so Pidge sent the second.

“Close, it’s our sector, but we need the adjacent one,” Allura said. Pidge transferred the third file, and this time Allura blinked a few times, confused. “This is it, albeit incomplete, I have his route before he came to this side of the crevasse.”

Pidge barely contained a shriek of victory. Though the last thing he wanted to do was attract unwanted attention. He did, however, high five his brother. Matt’s face popped up on all of the video feeds, sending them in transparency in the background. “Nice work, Knuckles.”

Pidge nodded, but couldn’t focus on anything but the rest of the files. He needed something more than Shiro’s routes, they couldn’t possibly just follow their traces.

“I’ll see if there’s anything else we can use, maybe a way to contact them,” Pidge mumbled, “but I’ll need a better equipment—they’ll still have the Safeguard to lose.”

Lance’s window popped up. “Maybe we can split up? You and Hunk go back to the village, while we follow the Safeguard at distance, and-” Matt cut him off.

“That’s out of the question. We should intercept Shiro and Keith, find a way to get ahead of them and bring them back on this side of the sector.”

Allura nodded distantly. “I agree, following the Safeguard is too risky—especially if it separates to cover a wider surface. You may get trapped, and therefore killed.”

Pidge sighed, tapping through the file paths, until he was back to square one. There were still a lot of folders to go through, so it was only then did he notice the unanswered notification in the bottom corner of the notepad screen. He’d been so focused on the maps, he’d forgotten to click any pop-up that appeared once the hardware was installed.

Tapping on it, the pop-up showed a simple error message. He’d set all his devices to show even hidden folders, but apparently these ones required admin privileges to show. Pidge blinked, his brows furrowing further as he managed a way past some SNDK00998 user.

As soon as the program finished decrypting the password, ten new folders were added to the list—each individually compressed and encrypted.

“What in the ruggle is this?” he mumbled, tuning out the chit-chat around him.

Hunk came over to crouch next to him. “Is this the stuff you got from Shiro?” he asked.

Pidge nodded. “This stuff is heavily guarded though, and-” His voice came to a halt when his eyes fell on the last of the folders. “Guys?” he called, everyone going quiet. “I think I know how to find Shiro... but I’ll need Allura’s stuff.”

* * *

Keith was tired from all the running. He hadn’t slept enough to exert himself like this. His lungs were seizing with each breath and his blood pounded right beneath his skin with adrenaline, fear and urgency. Shiro’s shared HUD was coming dangerously close to an end, and Shiro himself had progressively slowed down—so now Keith had to drag him to keep up.

The City was quiet around them, and Keith knew it all very well to know he shouldn’t trust it. Since he’d gotten out of the village, he’d learned the different kinds of silence—and every one of them could become deadly in a matter of seconds.

The air buzzed with tension, Keith’s whole body jerked every now and then when he felt eyes on his back. Yet, no one seemed to be following them. They’d left the explosions behind, and Keith only only heard a few more before dropping further inside the sector, putting more distance between them and their their pursuers.

At one point, Shiro had pointed him to another conglomerate of what should’ve been apartments—Keith had found them, and they were usually the only places they would camp in. They were lonely, quiet and hollow, in which even small steps echoed for a few seconds before disappearing.

They would’ve been able to hide without being detected, and instead hear whoever might’ve entered the place.

“C’mon, Shiro, we’re almost there,” Keith croaked, throat so dry it hurt when he swallowed.

Shiro made some noncommittal sound just behind him, but pushed ahead. The HUD lasted only a few minutes before Shiro’s power ran out, and though Keith knew he shouldn’t let his panic swipe in, nor kiss goodbye any form of rational thinking but he still couldn’t help but feel it, struggling to push it down, the rush of coldness that gripping his insides and twisting.

They were doomed, or they soon would be.

Keith didn’t like disenchantment, he knew when a situation looked bad and knew just how much he could pull off to save his skin, knew when he could push through and make it, even if just barely. This wasn’t one of those situations. This looked worse than anything he’d ever been in—in fact this looked an awful lot like Sam’s expedition.

Keith pushed the thought aside as they reached inside one of the rooms. The buildings were tilted, built that way oddly enough, and Keith cursed the way the ground lifted in such an odd angle upon stepping inside.

They had to discard this one, for the sake of practicality—they wouldn’t have any advantage on this kind of uneven ground. It would’ve been useless.

“Let’s try the next one,” Keith groaned between each breath. His whole body was screaming to drop and rest, but he wouldn’t accept it as an option.

Shiro’s body, on the other hand, had different plans. Keith had only turned for a second before Shiro collapsed on the floor. Keith barely had time to catch Shiro’s shoulder easing him onto the ground, flat on his back.

“Shiro,” he called, and he hated every bit of concern his voice showed. He  _ was _ concerned for Shiro, for the way he’d taken the shitty situation they’d put themselves in and didn’t blame it on Keith—not even once.

He’d been kind. He’d been _respectful_ , and Keith didn’t know what to think of it, but he knew better than to hide or shy away from the fondness, the warmth, that had spread in his chest when Shiro let him know that he still hadn’t analysed Keith.

Keith wasn’t blind, he’d seen the way Shiro’s head twisted and his expression tensed when his pupils flashed a small bit of red. He knew Shiro had just decided something that would’ve caused distress, by waiting for Keith’s consent. It was mostly that one small thing that had convinced Keith to let Shiro analyse him.

He’d been so tense to learn the answer, but Shiro had only blinked and confirmed his suspicions—negative. Keith was nothing special, just like any other human in his village. It was both disappointing and relieving.

_ I highly doubt he will do anything beside move on, if we do not pique his interest. _

Allura’s words rang in his ears like a painful reminder. Shiro wasn’t planning on sticking around if they didn’t have what he was looking for, and Keith wasn’t sure why the notion didn’t spark any happiness in him. When did things change? When did he stop being wary of this  _ thing _ that had saved his life?

Keith was brought back to attention by Shiro’s hand. “I have- syringes. Energy. But you have to,” his voice, something close to a glitch, but still human… Keith didn’t know what to make of it. “Stop. The bleeding.”

Keith nodded. It made sense, new energy would’ve just been drained if they didn’t stop Shiro from bleeding out. He peeled his own armour off, he needed his fingers, the bodysuit alone was enough to deprive him from any precise tactile information—but since he didn’t have the time, he settled to be rid only of the plates.

“Okay, stay with me Shiro,” Keith instructed, looking for anything that could tell him how to do the same for Shiro’s armour. It was hard, and Keith cursed the way multiple plates and patches had been added to the bodysuit. It was like a maze of millions of different little things. What in the  _ hell _ did Shiro do to his suit? Some of it was even  _ glued  _ together with something like tar.

Keith found a way through frustration, although he came awfully close to using Shiro’s knife to just open the damn thing and peel it off Shiro’s body.

Shiro coughed as he tried to help Keith, and though Keith complained, he knew it would’ve been harder—and longer—to take it off by himself. Keith settled to just open the bodysuit as wide as he could, so he could focus on the wound.

Under the body tight suit, Shiro had a broad chest with bulky muscles, it was like watching a statue—the old ones Keith and the others had found in one of their expeditions. Scars littered Shiro’s torso, mostly cuts and chemical burns, and Keith had to keep himself from tracing them as he opened up the upper part of Shiro’s suit.

Shiro was  _ beautiful _ , and Keith knew he was blushing at the thought.

He concentrated on helping Shiro back down on the floor while examining the wound instead. It was circular, and Keith only had seen something this clean on bodies the Safeguard had killed. Blood was slowly diverting its course—from down the abdomen and under Shiro’s lower suit, now directly on his side, dripping down on the hard ground. The wound’s precision was almost surgical, and Keith suppressed the fear it gave him. Precision was a thing, but this? This was something that they clearly couldn’t escape from.

Shit, if even Shiro couldn’t escape from it, how was Keith supposed to survive it?

“Two. Min…s,” Shiro’s voice bashed through Keith’s thoughts and helped him shove them all in the back of his mind.

“Okay, I got you,” Keith whispered as he opened his belt pocket, the one he’d used to treat his own wound.

“Knife.”

Keith startled at Shiro reaching for his own knife and offering it to him. “ _ What _ ?” he asked, and then understood altogether. Shiro did something, Keith didn’t know how or what, but the knife’s blade quickly glowed a hot, bright red.

Keith took the knife, and then eyed Shiro. Was he sure? “This- this will hurt,” he exhaled as he braced himself, more than Shiro.

“Can’t. Feel. Hurry-”

So Keith did. He pressed the knife on the wound and gritted his teeth when the skin sizzled. Yet Shiro didn’t move, not one inch, nor did he express discomfort. Keith turned to check on him, but at least he was happy to see the blood had been stopped.

Keith sighed in relief and turned Shiro on his side. Shiro was heavy—heavier than he looked—and Keith grunted in frustration with how long it took. Still, he managed to cauterise the puncture hole on the other side too. It was sloppy, and Keith knew he’d needed to treat it and bandage Shiro properly once they were out of the woods.

“Sy... ringe.” Shiro’s voice was only a whisper, his head lying disorderly on the floor. Keith let out a shaky breath as he touched for anything that  _ felt _ like a syringe. He found it on Shiro’s external thigh, dragged one out and then was back on Shiro.

Only then did he notice the small puncture hole on Shiro’s neck. He’d never noticed, with the suit’s collar hiding most of Shiro’s body, but now it was obvious—together with a whole lot of other signs. Keith didn’t think twice as he pressed the syringe on Shiro and pushed.

A soft hiss filled the silence, the thin glowing measurement marker on the syringe side quickly emptying, and Keith allowed himself to  finally take a breath. Shiro dropped back on his back, eyelids blinking repeatedly, confused. Keith stared as his body jerked and spasmed, until Shiro’s eyes flew open and Keith almost jerked into sitting position.

Shiro tensed and then went back on the ground. He eyed Keith. “Thank you,” he rumbled, his deep voice oddly calm..

Keith hated the way it reassured him, like Shiro knew everything would’ve been alright, eventually. Keith hated false hope—he’d learned since he was a kid not to want, not to dream of a better future. The City was cruelest with the dreamers and optimists. Sam’s death had been more than a lesson, it had been an example for them to not raise such a foolish hope again, to not dream that they could do anything but live their short lives.

Keith could only hope to die of age, but he knew better than to think it. He’d known everyone would be slaughtered by the Safeguard, sooner or later. It was only a matter of time, and they were all delusional if they thought anyone could do anything about it.

Keith closed his eyes, jaw somehow working, as he plopped down and sighed. “I’ll treat the wound, I’ve got some spare molecular tape.” He turned and rummaged through his things, bringing out the balms and anything he could need.

He hesitated, turned to look at Shiro. “Are you going to be alright?” he asked.

Shiro didn’t reply right away. “Non-essential biocomponents have been damaged, it will take a while to fix them.”

Keith scowled. He could feel a witty remark coming, but he kept it to himself. He still had stuff to do before Shiro was out of the woods. He removed his bodysuit gloves—it wasn’t as hygienic as a sterile hand, but they would just have to make do.

He took the balm in his hands and took a handful on his fingers. “This should help, uh, but I think it’ll scar,” he exhaled. He couldn’t exactly imagine Shiro be bothered by it, not with a body like this, not with all the scars he was already carrying. “What happened to you?” Keith couldn’t help but ask, eyeing Shiro’s scars.

Shiro was staring at the ceiling, his expression was as cryptic as anything he’s shown Keith so far. “I do not remember.” Shiro stared at himself, as if he was looking at his own body for the first time in his entire life. “I have never dwelled on it,” he said, and then frowned, “though I suppose that those  _ are _ a lot of scars.”

Keith snorted. “Yeah, they are,” he agreed.

“Do you have a lot of scars, Keith?” Shiro asked, and there it was again—the softness in Shiro’s voice each time he said Keith’s name. It made Keith’s breath hitch, and his chest shrink.

Keith swallowed hard and looked away. “Not- not a lot,” he mumbled. “I mean, I’ve got a few—but they’re most from my stupid, and reckless, childhood.” His jaw painfully reminded him of the newly acquired one, though. “And I guess this one too, now.”

Shiro was looking at him. Keith could feel his eyes on himself—and it was way too obvious to turn, but his face decided to go and flush anyway. He hurried and applied the balm on Shiro’s wound.

And then, his whole world shifted in the blink of an eye. It was like being pulled underwater, unable to breathe—yet, it wasn’t painful, and Keith didn’t  _ need _ to breathe. His brain supplied the information like it was only natural, like it knew what was happening.

Keith was calmer as he sank deep in the dark, further down the surface. It was like following a thread, an invisible thread that someone had put there. The dark wasn’t as dark as he thought, it was a deeper shade of blue, but Keith could still make out some shapes.

It was a city, or what was left of it.

Keith was laid down almost with gentleness. Whatever he was wearing, it felt like it was made of light—something luminous and soft on his body. His whole perceptions were off, like he wasn’t quite touching anything, and yet something was  _ definitely _ touching him.

He moved around, concern bubbling up inside of him—it was muffled, like Keith was distant from himself. Like those weren’t exactly his sensations to feel. The whole place was numb, asleep. Keith looked up, hoping to find a ceiling, and yet there was none.

Above his head, above all the buildings and the dust and the water-not-water, was a deep dark blue expanse full of tiny, haphazardly clumps of white, shiny dots—they were the only source of light, dim and ever so quiet. And then there were shreds of dirty white, fluffy and funny looking bits that crossed the sea of dots and turned slightly purple on their edges.

Keith had never seen anything like it, but he’d remembered the old legends, how the City once was only but a smaller section of a planet, how humans were infinitely more copious than machines, and how the sky would cover everyone’s head.

“Keith.”

Keith turned, only to see Shiro. “Is that the sky?” he asked, and then he remembered—he should’ve been confused and lost, because he still didn’t know where he was.

Shiro looked up and shrugged. “I do not know.”

“Where are we?” Keith asked then, his voice a still and continuous flow.

“You are interfacing-”

▉▉█▉ ▉❚❙❘

Keith was startled by the sound, confused by the word Shiro had used. Interfacing? What was that about? He turned in the direction the sound was coming from and frowned—deeper into the buildings where the light didn’t reach. “What was that?”

Shiro was suddenly in his visual. “Nothing, Keith. I would like to know how you were able to interface with me at all, though.”

▀▘∎■▚▖▖

Keith’s gut twisted with anxiety at the same noise. It was harsh, glitchy, but it brought far more heaviness than the whole place—it was desperate, like someone screaming from the bottom of their lungs.

“I- I don’t know. How do I get out?” he fumbled, and at the same time his whole body gave him the answer. Deeper into the darkness, deeper into the city, wherever that noise came from, it was also his way out.

“This way, Keith.” Shiro dragged one arm, clearly wanting to limit Keith’s options. He pointed behind Keith, where Keith knew the lights could shine better on the shapes and buildings.

Keith withdrew instinctively. This Shiro was  _ off, _ the sharpness in his tone and movements weren’t Shiro’s, especially the voice he used to call Keith. It was disorienting, and Keith had learned long ago to trust his guts above all else. Still, he didn’t know why his guts suddenly urged him to run  _ towards _ the scary sensations—as if it were a matter of life or death.

He pretended to turn and follow Shiro’s, skin crawling with anticipation. When Shiro moved his step to reach his side, Keith turned once more and ran towards the darkness. Relief and…  _ victory? _ Lightness filled Keith’s heart, but his heart was hammering in his chest. It was unsettling at best, and confusing.

“Keith.”

Behind him, Shiro’s voice sounded close to his ear as if he were right next to him. Keith pushed forward and screamed when  _ things _ tied around his limbs and slowed him down. They dug into Keith’s arms and legs and squeezed, hard, and Keith knew he’d bleed if his body were there with him.

“Let me go!” he shouted, and some of the loops loosened around him.

“I cannot let you go there, Keith.” Shiro’s voice was cold now, it pierced right inside of Keith’s mind like nails, digging their way into his brain. “Come with us, this will be easier if you cooperate.”

_ Us? Who is us?, _ was all Keith could think, before intent came rushing back in. “I said. Let. Me. Go.”

Just as if by sheer will, the ties loosened once more, and Keith was able to tear himself from them. His whole body ached, but he kept pushing.

■∎▗▖▀▘

Keith hurried, until it was all darkness and the only thing he could still know for sure was the ground under his feet. Then, suddenly, the sensations drew him  _ down, _ but there was nowhere to go. Keith couldn’t go any lower.

The pull got worse with each step he took, until Shiro’s voice came crushing on him too. “You cannot reach him, come back. It is already too late.”

Keith’s breath hitched. Who was he too late for? Why didn’t Shiro want him down here?

He started digging, but wherever he was, this world responded differently to his will. With Keith’s horror, the first enormous chunk of ground got ripped from underneath him. It flew right against  _ something, _ a building Keith thought.

Keith dug again, and yet another chunk flew just a few inches from his face, moving the not-exactly-water around him and then impacting somewhere in the distance. The lights grew eerie by the tic, and now they reached for Keith as well.

_ D _ ▉❚ _ n _ ❘ _ h _ ▀ _ r _ ▘

Keith stammered when the glitches cleared out. It was a voice. It was a  _ thing _ voice, and the  _ thing’ _ s voice was dangerously similar to Shiro’s. The Shiro who had been calling Keith’s name like it was something soft and interesting, even though he didn’t exactly have anything more than his bad attitude and closed-off mood.

_ Keith. _

“Shiro?” he called, desperation breaking out as a river in flood. New chunks flew right past him. “Shiro, I’m here- what’s going on?”

_ Down h _ ▘ _ re, Keith. _

Keith felt like choking—he was holding his breath, and now the not-exactly-water around him became more and more  _ exactly _ like water. Keith coughed up, and his mouth filled with drops. He was drowning—he’d drown before he could find Shiro.

Then, Keith saw it—a hand, sticking out of the ground. Blood throbbed under his temples, it was hounding Keith with urgency and dread. He reached out for Shiro and grabbed him at the same time the  _ other _ Shiro clawed his forearm.

“Enough,” the other Shiro said.

Keith blinked as Shiro slapped his hand away from his wound and howled in pain. Keith jerked away and fell on his back on the hard ground—lungs burning as he gasped for air. They were back in the City, he was back in his own body, and Shiro was still laying down on the ground in his own blood.

Shiro’s voice tore through the silence. Keith stared in horror as the man writhed in pain, tensing and kicking the air. “What did you do?!” Shiro growled, hands pressing hard against his wound. He kept repeating the same question, but Keith had no answers for him.

He had no idea what just happened, he only knew he was more lost than before, and Shiro may have two of himself inside his head—if that was really where Keith had been.

Keith blinked and then hurried back to Shiro’s side, hands in the air—he was at a loss on what to do. Would Shiro even listen to him? He doubted it. “You gotta be quiet,” he hissed, eyes darting between Shiro’s pained expression and outside the building they were in.

Shiro grumbled and hit the back of his head back on the ground, gritted teeth and eyes closed shut. His breaths were laboured, he was panting, gasping for breath. “I don’t- know what-” Shiro hissed. “What’s this?”

Keith had  _ no idea _ what “this” was, but he hushed him nonetheless—Shiro kept pushing his fingers on his burned flesh, and Keith wondered. “You’re in pain,” he exhaled with dumbfounded realisation. “Are you in pain?”

“Pain?” Shiro breathed out with confusion. “I- I guess so.”

Keith frowned. Shiro’s speech patterns had changed too—he sounded more human than  _ thing _ and Keith wasn’t sure what to do with such information. He forced himself to focus on the task at hand. He had to prioritise Shiro, and then he could ask all the questions he needed to.

He rummaged in his belt pockets until he found a small vial. He was sure he’d need a syringe to inject it, but he had none. Unless Shiro’s syringe could be filled again with something else.

Keith jerked, eyes scouting for the syringe until he found it, just over Shiro’s shoulder. On a closer inspection, the syringe  _ could _ be used again, but Keith had no idea how. Shiro extended a hand and Keith let him take the syringe—he pressed his thumb on its side until the lower part popped and retracted the needle.

“Vial,” Shiro panted, and Keith offered the vial as well. Shiro pressed the far end of the syringe to its cap and then it popped again. The vial slowly emptied, and the syringe filled halfway with the same light-blue light. Only this time it would flash every few tics.

“Hurry.”

Keith moved, injecting the painkillers. Allura had told him how to, and he was glad he still remembered. Shiro blindly stared at him as he worked, it was strangely calming to take control of the situation, something Keith finally understood and could help with.

His brain still tried to derail his train of thoughts, rewinding the conversation he’d had with the other Shiro. He shoved the thoughts aside—he’d ask Shiro  _ after _ he’d feel better.

Shiro took a deep breath and relaxed on the ground, slowly. Keith’s heart eased its tight grip too, and Keith could finally settle back. Relief flooded his thoughts; he’d done it. Shiro coughed quietly, chest rising and falling progressively to a rhythmic and even intervals.

“What did you do?” he asked again, head turning towards Keith.

Keith didn’t know what to say. He was just as lost as Shiro was. “I- I don’t know,” he hesitated. “Do you remember anything?” he asked.

Shiro shook his head, then he frowned. “I don’t,” he mumbled, but Keith could see the uncertainty in his features. “I was… calling to you.”

Keith’s heart shrunk in his chest.

“Like I was trapped.”

Keith closed in and his breath caught, Shiro was staring at him with a different kind of light in his eyes now. It was intense, and Keith had to force himself not to avert his eyes. Before he could say anything, Shiro’s gloved hand reached for his, and Keith took it before he could even realise it. Warmth bloomed inside his chest, and just the tiniest part of him dared remind him that he shouldn’t have been doing this. They had no time, and there was no way they could-

“Are you okay?” Shiro asked, concern clearly showing on his features. “How’s your wound?”

Keith snorted. “You’re the one with a hole in your side,” he chuckled, but it was tired and low, almost a whisper.

Shiro’s lips quirked a smile, the faintest one, but it was there, and Keith’s heart skipped a beat. He couldn’t focus on his breathing anymore, and he knew it was faster, heavier—he hoped Shiro wouldn’t notice. “I’m a tough guy,” he mumbled.

Keith laughed, it was light and relieved—the lighter he’d been feeling in a lot of time. He sighed, eyes falling on his hand still held by Shiro’s. It was easy, it was comfortable, and Keith shivered at the idea. Whatever it was, it made him full and warm.

“I’ll go check the perimeter,” he coughed after a bit. “Make sure nothing’s heard us.”

Shiro grimaced, like he was about to decide against it, but didn’t move. “I don’t think that would be safe,” he settled for, eventually.

Keith frowned, eyebrow raising. “I don’t think anything would be safe, not at this point.”

“Okay, uhm,” Shiro weighed—did Shiro just  _ uhm _ him?—and grimaced again. “I think this is the less dangerous option.”

Keith blushed when Shiro tightened his grip on his hand and sat down next to him. Shiro looked puzzled for a moment, like he was trying to decide something of vital importance. Keith leaned in, head tilting to one side. “Is- everything okay?” he asked quietly.

Shiro finally looked at him, and his eyes widened. “There’s- there is a- like a prompt? But it’s not coming from System, and I don’t exactly  _ get it, _ so.”

Keith frowned. “Is it your speech pattern? You- you did change it,” he said.

Shiro shook his head, and then he was sitting down. Keith tried to keep him from moving too much, but Shiro wouldn’t listen. He sat down where he was, and his side brushed lightly against Keith’s knee. Shiro was still looking at his own hands, now untangled and free, like they were somewhat new or alien to him. He removed his gauntlets and showed the skin underneath, it was battered and scarred like everything else on Shiro’s body.

Keith wanted to trace the scars, ask him what their story was, but Shiro had already told him; he didn’t remember how he got them, his memories had been corrupted. There was simply no way to know anything about Shiro that Keith didn’t already know. It felt off, wrong, like there should be so much more—Keith wanted it to be more.

“May I touch you?” Shiro asked suddenly, and Keith’s heart skipped a whole series of beats altogether.

He stammered through his answer. “I, yes?”

Keith ignored—or, well, tried to ignore—how his whole face heated up when Shiro reached for his unwounded cheek, tracing his cheekbone ever so lightly. It was delicate, the way Shiro approached him, like he was sure he’d scare Keith away if he moved too suddenly.

Keith breathed through his mouth, without realising it, when Shiro’s fingertips moved slowly down to the curve of his mouth, brushing against its edges and tracing the crease of the upper lip. Shiro’s touch left hot traces on his skin, and Keith wasn’t sure he should’ve been feeling this waves of heat through him at all, but he was and he couldn’t help it.

It was a heavy thing to carry with him, but it didn’t weight at all, it settled deep within his soul and held him stable.

Shiro’s liquid eyes were focused, too, on his mouth. They moved with Shiro’s fingers and gave Keith’s lips the kind of attention Keith had never really sought, wanted, or let alone experienced. It made his stomach turn upside down, and his chest tight and light at the same time. It made him want to lean in and breathe out all the warmness he had to offer, see what Shiro’s warmth tasted like. It made him needy and desperate in a way Keith had never wished to be, and yet here he was, betraying that same old promise. He didn’t mind so much anymore.

Keith’s lips parted—and Shiro’s eyes zeroed on the movement. Keith swallowed hard when he saw something darkening Shiro’s gaze, like  _ hunger _ but not quite. Keith tensed in anticipation as Shiro’s fingers slid on his lips, dry and scraped, and full of  _ care. _ It was a small, delicate movement, but Keith’s whole existence tilted on its axis. His spine was weak all of a sudden, just like his knees. He drew a breath in, drew Shiro’s scent in; it tasted of dust and metal, the sharpness of blood and the chemicals of whatever Shiro had been injected with.

Keith resisted the impulse to lick, to  _ suck _ on Shiro’s fingers, or to open further his mouth. He shouldn’t be wanting this, not with a  _ thing, _ no matter how careful and  _ human _ such thing acted.

Too early, Shiro pulled away and stared at Keith in confusion. “Is this normal?” he asked, lost.

Keith didn’t know what to say. “I don’t know,” he exhaled—why did he sound like he was out of breath?

Shiro’s expression faltered and quickly faded to contrite.

Keith looked down, and then decided to close his eyes altogether, rubbing his face with his hand. He was hot, and his body wouldn’t simply calm down. This was stupid. He was being stupid. Keith wanted to dig a hole and never get out.

“Was it okay?”

Shiro’s voice snapped Keith from his own thoughts, and he was back at staring into Shiro’s eyes—magnets pulling Keith closer. Shiro looked hopeful, and it was the most painful and filling sensation Keith had experienced. He nodded quietly.

Shiro lit up. “Thank you,” he stated matter-of-factly.

Keith was shocked at how happy Shiro looked. Did  _ Keith _ do that? He wasn’t sure he could muster the mental energy to even take the possibility into consideration. Instead, he opted to inch closer and help Shiro lay down on his back. They stared at each other for a long pause, until Keith had to move—lest his legs started tingling with stiffness.

“So… you have these prompts now?” he inquired carefully. “How?”

Shiro shrugged. “I think they’re…” Shiro hesitated, he looked like he was weighting what words to use, “feelings,” he settled for.

Keith ignored how his heart skipped a beat. He could only manage a small, “Oh.”

“I think you taught me.” When Shiro looked at him, Keith was sure he must’ve had a pretty confused look too, because Shiro spoke again. “It’s like, when I was calling to you, you answered and pulled me out of-  _ something.  _ It’s like, I was stuck somewhere, and now I’m freer to feel.”

Keith was suddenly glad he’d dug, inside whatever-that-was, he was relieved he didn’t listen to the other Shiro. He liked this Shiro better. He smiled and stroked Shiro’s face with his hand. “You should rest,” he exhaled. “I’ll keep watch.”

Shiro nodded, eyelids already heavy with weariness. Keith hushed him quietly until Shiro’s breath was soft and even, a steady rhythm that kept Keith company for the rest of the wait.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanna thank [@herzblutrose](http://herzblutrose.tumblr.com/post/178454640065/parasite-paradise-so-emsawards-just-went-and) on Tumblr for their amazing fanart I still can't believe they were inspired so much by the fic to actually draw something based on it. I'M STILL CRYING. THANK YOU SO MUCH. @FOLKS LOOK AT KEITH'S FACE. THAT'S EXACTLY HIS FACE. ALSO THE HAIR AND THE ARMOUR. AHHHHH.
> 
> As always, I have a

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on [Tumblr](http://hikku.tumblr.com) if you want to freak out with me in my ask!! Please do, it helps my stupid brain to hype and write stuff <3


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